I fully concur with the appeal expressed by Archbishop Charles Scicluna in The Sunday Times of Malta (December 23) that we Maltese should continue celebrating Christmas until The Epiphany.

[attach id=690423 size="medium" align="right"]The Epiphany is still a public holiday in a number of European countries. Photo: Shutterstock[/attach]

This feast has been celebrated throughout the Catholic world since the second century. I still re­collect that a few decades ago The Epiphany was also a public holiday in Malta but it was abolished by Dom Mintoff’s Labour government post-1971.

The Epiphany is still a public holiday in a number of European countries such as Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Greece, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland, Finland and Slovakia. In Germany and Switzerland it is a public holiday in a number of regions.

Should the government reintroduce this public holiday it will be automatically boosting the econo­my by extending the Christmas festive season. If good will prevails it can be perhaps substituted for another far less important public holiday.

The Archbishop’s appeal has indeed given us some food for thought.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.