Daniel Swan

So according to the BBC today, the Archbishop of Wales trots out the usual Christmas bollocks about how the atheists are ruining Christmas for the masses.

Choice quotage:

The archbishop said “atheistic fundamentalism” was a new phenomenon.

He said it advocated that religion in general and Christianity in particular have no substance, and that some view the faith as “superstitious nonsense”.

As well as leading to Christmas being called “Winterval,” the archbishop said “virulent, almost irrational” attacks on Christianity led to hospitals removing all Christian symbols from their chapels, and schools refusing to allow children to send Christmas cards with a Christian message.”

What is particularly annoying about this is that Church leaders whining about Christmas being ruined is not a new phenomenon at all, it happens every year without fail, for as long as I can remember. It’s also patent rubbish. This business about Winterval, the banning of nativity plays etc. etc. etc. just isn’t true. The last time I checked 25% of primary schools were still Anglican, presumably therefore allowed to peddle whatever message of Christmas they like to their indoctrinated ‘consumers’.

The whole ‘Winterval’ thing is laughable – in 1997 Birmingham City Council decided to use this term to incorporate all the multi-faith (and secular!) celebrations over the winter period with an umbrella term. It was never in any way meant to denigrate, sideline or replace Christmas (or Eid, or Diwali or Guy Fawkes Night). Only the Daily Mail brigade took it that way, and 10 years later senior Church members are still lying about it.

Chapels in hospital are removing Christian symbology? Well I’m aware that some hospitals have multi-faith ‘prayer areas’ where presumably Christians, Muslims and atheists who want a bit of peace and quiet can go and think/pray/whatever, but surely Christian trappings would be inappropriate in this context? I’ve worked in plenty of hospitals with chapels and mosques, so where, pray tell, is the Bishop getting these crazy ideas from?

Atheistic fundamentalism is only getting fundamentalist because we’re now angry with the propagation of the same old lies, half truths and cries of ‘political correctness gone mad’ that we’re no longer prepared to humor them. These people must be held up, pilloried and harrassed with facts and logic until the stupid, banal and untrue statements are finally laid to rest.

I love Christmas, I do, I really do, but I no longer associate it with any Christian message. That’s for me to decide to do and practice. If you want to go to Church, think about the baby Jesus that’s all fine, but don’t lie about how atheistic observation of Christmas is ‘ruining it for the rest of you’.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 22nd, 2007 at 1:10 pm and is filed under About me, Links, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.