If there is ever a time to relax, have fun, give thanks, worship, look back, look forward and enjoy and celebrate, it must be Christmas. You don’t even have to believe in Christ. I don’t believe in fruit cake, eggnog or turkey, but this never stopped me enjoying them! Like all kings, Jesus has a natural and an official birth date and they set the latter to coincide with convenient things as the winter solstice, end of harvest and the year.

There is a difference between celebrating Christmas (Christ’s coming) and celebrating at Christmas. In the former, groups believe in Christ and in the latter, others just benefit from the holidays given to honour his birth. Christmas is important for two reasons.

First, we are a Christian nation – nominal or active – and Christmas is special. Advent culminates in the birth (arrival) of the Messiah. Jesus was not an important person, so His birth, words and deeds were not recorded by Roman or Jewish historians and our RGD has no birth certificate for him. Had they known He would be an icon 2000 years later, Herod would have assigned him a reporter and cameraman. He is royalty and like the Queen has a ceremonial birthday. Some Christians do not celebrate His birth and that’s a puzzle. The Jews expected a Messiah. He came, but few took notice. Can you be Christian if you do not mark His birth? Or celebrate it? Isn’t the Messiah’s birth the core of the gospel? Jesus and His disciples were Jews – worshipped in the temple, same day, same priests; ate the same foods, wore the same clothes. Granted, most Jews felt He was the Messiah, but He was a Jew first. The first crop of non-Jewish followers also worshipped as Jews but in a separate area of the temple. Jesus’ birth was prophecy fulfilled so His followers celebrated then, and so do we. Incidentally, to most of the world’s people, Jesus – a 33-year-old practising Jew – is saviour (Christian) or major prophet (Islam). So, why are Jews hated? Why did a Christian nation as Germany abide the murder of millions of Jews? Bizarre, isn’t it?

Second, Jamaican culture is rooted in Christianity – a lot around Easter and Christmas. Its values underpin our democracy, government, legal, social and personal mores. The gospel came to us bundled in British culture; hence we dress like them, enjoy Maypole and embrace their ways just as early non-Jewish Christians dressed, ate, worshipped as Jews. If this virus had come from Christian Ethiopia, Syria, Armenia (the first state to adopt Christianity in 300CE), it would come with their culture. Rastafari use a version with an Ethiopian cultural package as foreign to us as the others. Christ and Christmas are the main drivers of our culture – not just music. Believe in Christ, yes or no, but Christmas justifies our most enjoyable holidays and its cultural emanations include the following:

* Food and flora as fruits soaked in Appleton whites, Red Label and interred in delicious cakes; Christmas punch, eggnog; red and white sorrel drink; gungo rice and peas; white euphorbia and red poinsettia – our seasonal florescence and gift to the world!

*Entertainment as junkanoo with horse head, grand market – the hub of our last-minute gifts – domestic craft and retail therapy – you have your list too! Christmas is about having fun, buying, selling; giving, receiving, praising God, forgiving, doing nothing, resting; it’s about children and all you can do in our free society. We all don’t go to church – that’s no problem. Even when God chose the Jews he knew there were lots of other people around and other emanations guided them. So, here are some things to do over the holidays:

* Business is a key part. We are a market economy and this is the time retail makes some 45 to 60 per cent of its profits. If there are no profits, businesses fail, we lose jobs, the state gets less tax, social services are curtailed and we lose more jobs, can’t pay bills, hardships descend and we all suffer! Support the shops and buy local as much as you can!

* This is time for personal therapy, catharsis, cool-out and recovery; hearts are open to give, receive and even the wicked and selfish may be touched. For it is written:

“Blessed is the man who eats no contractor ham, drinks no kickback booze and has the receipt for the 23-lb turkey; yea even unto the cranberry sauce on his table; that his wife and children may be strong and upright, the land flourish and the nation rejoice!”

Go sing some carols or go to a midnight service. Most towns have a big “corporate Babylon church”. No one bothers you, asks if you are saved or if you love Jesus. Just go in for an hour or so and sing your worries away and get some spiritual healing!

* Do something for the disadvantaged; nothing elaborate and you don’t need the media! There is a depressed area or urban centre with needy people nearby, so have a “48th block party” for 50 people. A Mona, Earls Court or Vineyard Town can have about 7/8 block parties in each community. Get a cake, some drinks, a few gifts, use a sidewalk, front yard or the verge outside your gated community – two hours singing, munching, talking, listening to uplifting music; we can have hundreds of small parties! Spread some joy!

* Firms should have 5/6 block parties lasting three hours max instead of one mega-party all day; spread the benefits. There is more to life than the greater glory of the company! Sing carols and holiday songs along the streets in your community so all can join in.

Christmas is hard for many. Pray for Christians in Baghdad who still use Aramaic after 2000 years. Churches are being bombed, members killed; some cancelled Christmas and a seventh-century monastary near Niniveh lost hundreds of monks – the high price Christians pay in Iraq. This week I intoned TS Eliot’s Journey of the Magi in church and I felt close to home. You say my columns are an “acquired taste” and I thank you. My mind works differently and I have no desire to be the salt, sugar or trans fat of the journalistic world. Continue to read this quality newspaper and you will build mind muscle, not flab! I can’t use all the information you send, but keep it coming. We have a lot to do in the coming year, so rest up! Have a Merry, conscious Christmas, my friend!

Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants currently on assignment in the UK.

franklinjohnston@hotmail.com