Christmas is a closed text. It is a repeat performance that has been playing on loop for centuries, with a plot that is as predictable as one of those messages you find inside a fortune cookie.
The ghosts of Christmas past, present and future are, in reality, identical triplets. Come Christmas, a child will excitedly deliver the sermon during midnight Mass, aged parents will reminisce about authentic imbuljuta recipes, relatives will attempt to bridge the generational distance by recounting embarrassing anecdotes of when you were younger, gifts – in the wrong size and colour – will be exchanged and decade-old jokes will be passed around the table.
It’s a menu of traditional dishes we reheat every December.
And then, when all is said and done, we will take out the proverbial pen and paper and plot against our inner Mr Hyde: how, next year, we will eat a little bit less, pray a little bit more, be better, less materialistic people and act kindly to everyone.
That is also the message that every year, the President, the Archbishop, the Prime Minister and the leader of the Opposition deliver – after 364 days of shouting matches, skullduggery, unfounded claims and counter-claims, they take out a well-read script to say that there is too much evil and hatred in the world so let us all join hands and light a little candle of kindness.
This element of repetition does not take away any of the significance of Christmas. Nor should it limit our efforts in being kinder. If anything, it should boost our resolve to do what we preach and to walk the walk.
In 1897, eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon wrote to The New York Sun, at the time a prominent newspaper, asking whether Father Christmas was real because some of her little friends were telling her he did not exist. The reply written by one of the editors, Francis Pharcellus Church, is still a precious lesson, more than a century later.
“Yes, Virginia, there is Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist,” the editor wrote. “Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders that are unseen and unseeable in the world.
“Nobody sees Santa Claus but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see.”
Hatred, cynicism and cruelty grab the headlines and elbow kindness out of the way to fill as many column inches as possible. Cruel words are more visible than kind words because what is bad shouts while goodness whispers. Ironically, the more space is available for publishing and airing our opinions – from blogs and social media to unmoderated comment boards – the less tolerant we are of other people’s opinions.
As soon as the President’s Republic Day speech – which called for national unity – was over, it was being lambasted by certain quarters for being a cliched exercise in sanctimonious rhetoric by someone with political baggage. Is it not the President’s role to speak her mind when she feels things are not working the way they should?
Hatred and shaming is all too visible and real. Like Santa Claus, kindness is hidden to most mortal eyes. But that does not mean it is not real.
This Christmas we should remove the blinkers of partisan politics, differing opinions, loathing, hostility and revenge and make kindness more visible.