We are now wrapped up in all the joys and anxieties of Christmas 2019. It is right that we should celebrate for this is one time of the year when we openly express a joy and conviviality that we hardly experience at any other time in the year. It is certainly a time for sharing with family and friends in a way we perhaps do not engage them during the year. It is a time when, by custom and convention, we consider a gift to someone, an issue that perhaps never crossed our minds at any other time of the year, except at an anniversary, birthday or some other commemorative event.

So, Christmas is a great time to which we typically look with a sense of joy. For me, it is not that I expect to receive any gifts. Those expectations tend to diminish as you age. Instead, it is an opportunity to spend some real quality time with family, especially with the grand kids.

Their joy is palpable, and you learn not to remove the myth of Santa Claus from them because of your own religious sense as an adult. There are just some things that do not do any damage to a child’s psyche or powerful sense of imagination. Believing in Santa is just one of them.

Children must be allowed to enjoy their myths and rituals, especially if there is no clear harm done to their psyche. An adult, on the other hand, who demonstrates such beliefs and actively pursues them would be highly recommended to seek help.

The accent on peace and goodwill at Christmastime must not be underestimated. The appeal has become so cliché that we can miss the relevance of what it represents. The call for peace is not anything new either.

The prophet Isaiah puts it well in Isaiah. 2:4, where he looks for the time to come when swords would be turned into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks; a time when nation would not take up sword against nation and when learning the art of war will become a thing of the past.

Of course, Isaiah was talking about the armaments of war that were used at his time, imaginatively less superior to those used today. It is inconceivable how we could turn atom bombs into ploughshares and pruning hooks, though tanks and aircraft could be converted, I suppose. I do not know how in Jamaica we could get our merchants of death not to learn the art of war any more, but instead to concentrate their minds on seeking the best welfare of the neighbour.

I do not know how we can convince US President Donald Trump, the impeached; and Kim Jong Un, the North Korean president, not to lift up their nuclear ‘swords’ against each other, and thus engulfing the world in sure annihilation. It is equally difficult how we can ever convince the Israelis and the Palestinians that it is in their best interests to work out a solution to their seemingly intractable hostilities, by recognising the intrinsic humanity of each other, rather than seeing their sons and daughters as enemies to be destroyed.

But I am sure we get what Isaiah is appealing for. I am sure that the peace for which he appeals is one that has to start from deep within each one of us.

The grudges and resentments that we harbour against each other have no ground on which to thrive unless we provide the fertile soil on which they feed.

They have no place to thrive in a heart given over to generosity and goodwill for others.

It is the absence of a generous heart that is the root of a great deal of the hatred and bigotry we see in the world around us. Peace, my dear Brutus, begins and ends in the heart that beats within us.

So, I am with Isaiah on this, as on so many other thoughts.

This Christmas again reminds me that I can either live my life in envy of other people’s achievements, or I can work doubly hard to make something of myself.

I can either be an agent of ill-will or I can be the one that allows a forgiving and generous spirit to guide me. Like all things that become too familiar, it is easy to take the Christmas season for granted and miss out on its real meaning and the contemplations that it allows us.

A lot of real introspection can be lost in the din and noise of the commercial activities at this time. Temperate behaviour can be replaced by running up debts to have a good time only to be sorry come January.

My heart goes out to those who have suffered tragedy over this year. Those who have lost loved ones to senseless violence are especially remembered. If you are lonely, feel abandoned, or have suffered disappointments, I pray that the grace of God and the quiet peace of the blessed Saviour will lift your spirits and give you a reason to be hopeful. You are much more significant than you or even your friends make you out to be.

Dr Raulston Nembhard is a priest and social commentator. Send comments to the Observer or stead6655@aol.com.

A merry Christmas to you all.