I
don't need a Christmas card from friends & family to know that they wish me well. I gave everyone a
year's warning when I was going to stop sending Christmas cards, but give the money saved to charities. I
am now considering being even more radical about Christmas than that. I need to
make my mind up soon whether to go ahead.
This
year it isn't just all the unhappy Christmases of my childhood, teenage
& early marriage, when all the grandparents were alive, that makes
me not enjoy Christmas. It's more that I look at our world & it just
seems so wrong to be celebrating in the way we do, whilst listening to
the news about war, famine, population migrations, with climate
change hovering over everything. Here at home we have unaccelptable levels of poverty & homelessness.
I
do think that it's good to be with & remember friends & family.
I do understand that all the Faiths have a celebration in mid winter
for very good reasons. I just think that our over consumption &
overspending has lost sight of what really matters & how unbalanced
the world is between the "haves" & "have nots". Listening to "Today"
this morning just made me really sad & caused real heartache.
I
know I can't right the wrongs, but I'm beginning to feel that I really
don't want to participate in it all. If I don't withdraw, I'm in danger
of really saying what I think at Christmas "Do's". I don't want
to do that because it would embarrass everyone & spoil their festivities. Everyone has the right to decide what they want to do. But there is a lot of pressure to go along with Christmas & all it entails in the UK. I have spent Christmas in Malta & in Libya. Not everyone celebrates in the consumerist way that we do.
This conflict within me has been going on for years, but it's worse now because of the dire situation we face at home & in the world. I'm trying not to be too negative, but when I think of the huge numbers of people in the world who have little or nothing I find it hard to believe that this is acceptable.
https://www.finder.com/uk/christmas-shopping-statistics
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