Happy Christmas to one and all from the Church of Jesus Christ Atheist!
It's what Jesus would have wanted, I suppose, but it's *definitely* what Christ wants. At Christmas, it's not so much the birth of Jesus that we are celebrating, but the birth of Christ. To the Atheistic Christian, Jesus functioned (quite possibly entirely unwittingly) to the "Christ" - an example of ideal moral conduct that could form the basis of narratives of human interactions that help us sort out what is important from what is unimportant or even harmful.
Scholars have known since at least the 19th Century that the charming tales of the nativity are not "historical" in any meaningful sense. Yes, Herod was a bastard (even though he was long dead before Quirinius became governor in Syria and administered Augustus's local census that didn't affect Nazareth...), but the contradictory accounts in Matthew and Luke provided the nucleus for a heartwarming mythical memeset surrounding the birth of Christ - the baby in all of us that represents triumph over adversity, new life from the jaws of death, the promise of Spring in the heart of winter. In regard to the latter, we in Northern Ireland have experienced plenty of that over the last few weeks.
But here we are - whether old folks complain about commercialism and rubbish music (I love carols, however) and greedly acquisitive little brats and the whole thing extending back to September - peace, love, goodwill and basic human decency do merit a festival, a celebration. After all, this is what the "Christ" meme is about - it's encapsulated perfectly in the story of the Good Samaritan, but the story, however apocryphal, of a baby born in Bethlehem in the bleak midwinter long ago tells us something much more profound than theists can really appreciate.
Happy Christmas, one and all.
Biblical novels
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