Stop trying to ban Christmas, we should be proud of this celebration - GP Taylor

Christmas songs are mandatory, but I don’t get into carolling until Christmas Day. In my household, presents are given every day as we celebrate the 12 days of Christmas. The festive season is a mixture of Christian and pagan. The new and the old mixed in together, just as it has been celebrated over the millennia. Mistletoe mixes with mulled wine, holly, St Nicholas and the Jesus story.

What we all must admit, is that Christmas didn’t start out as a Christian festival. Its roots go back into the dawn of time, when humankind first feared the lengthening nights were because the sun was dying.

As a child growing up on a council estate, my mother did all she could to make Christmas special. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we always had a great time.

Christmas is an important time of year. It is a time of hope, an ancient ritual and an acknowledgement of our annual journey around the sun. It is part of our national tradition, culture and heritage. I have celebrated Christmas with my family and alone during my divorce. Even in the lonely times, Christmas was a joy, even if it was dinner for one in front of Top of the Pops.

Yet, there are those who would like to water the celebration down and others who would like to do away with it all together. It is all part of a worldwide attack championed by the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen. In 2018, she said she wanted to ‘strengthen Europe’s commitment to inclusion and equality in all of its senses, irrespective of sex, racial or ethnic origin, age, disability, sexual orientation or religious belief’.

Unsurprisingly, Eurocrats are doing their best to push ‘Christmas’ out of EU-speak on the grounds that it could be offensive to non-Christians and have called for the use of the phrase ‘holiday period’. Even Tory government ministers have been advised to call their Christmas parties, ‘festive gatherings’, so as not to offend. How pathetic.

It is as if the ghost of Oliver Cromwell, the man who in 1647 banned Christmas has risen again.

I cannot understand how the word Christmas could be so offensive. The celebration comes at the darkest time of the year when people need to see the sparkle of Christmas trees and the occasional glass of Baileys.

The people who want us to stop talking about Christmas, do not ask Muslims to stop talking about Ramadan or Sikhs Diwali. Quite the contrary, we in Britain bend over backwards to be as inclusive as possible to other faiths and their celebrations, and yet are quick off the mark to get rid of the word Christmas in case it offends non-Christians. No one is forced to celebrate. It is a personal choice.

I am not offended by Diwali, Eid, or any other religious celebration. All of these make us a better and more diverse nation.

Growing up in a very secular, working-class family, I never saw anyone getting upset by Christmas. Even now, I know people of other faiths who celebrate the season with trees, presents and feasting. In many ways, Christmas is a time of inclusivity. It goes beyond being the possession of one faith group and has become a time of celebration for everyone.

Sadly, it seems as if there are a woke minority within society who wish to see offence at every opportunity. I read recently that some have said that contrary to popular opinion, the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was about bullying and exploitation. Santa was banned from riding his sleigh due to health and safety and Snow White is being rid of her little people.

Father Christmas himself has been accused of being too white, too male, and too middle aged. Even his coming down the chimney has been slated for giving children the wrong message.

Everything about Christmas is under scrutiny, but then again, in the woke world we now live in, the thought police are always one step behind you waiting to pounce. Even the programmes we watch and enjoy don’t escape their clutches.

Some of the best Christmas films are being criticised. Frank Capra’s classic It’s a Wonderful Life has been targeted because some wokers think Jimmy Stewart’s character was misogynistic.

Christmas is worth fighting for. Yes, it suffers from the problems of increasing commercialism, but it is a vested part of what it is to be British. It is a time of coming together as a nation to sing songs, party, eat, be merry, and remember the birth of a baby to an unmarried mother that changed the course of history.

GP Taylor is a writer and broadcaster who lives in Yorkshire.