Lessons from Christmases past

CHRISTMAS has changed.

No longer do we send quaint cards in the post. No longer do we window-shop on Frederick or High Streets or hunt around for presents in Port of Spain and environs. No longer do we attend midnight Mass done in Latin.

Today, we will Zoom or WhatsApp our greetings.

Gifts have already arrived thanks to Amazon, Skybox, Temu and Black Friday sales. Mass is not at midnight and certainly in English. It has been decades since anybody has roasted anything on an open fire – we have microwaves for that. Families will today surf Netflix.

Astonishing advances in technology have reshaped the world, and the commemoration of the birth of Jesus Christ with it. There is something wilfully ironic about the traditional nativity scene, which places the baby in a manger amid animals and straw.

In Trinidad and Tobago, that irony intermingles with the real trauma, pain, and fear generated by a murderous crime rate at a historic high. Christmases past allowed for gentle reflection. They did not have to contend, in such a widespread way, with the sharp edge of harrowing stories and grief in ravaged communities. So many are gone.

Yet, parts of the holiday have not changed.

We still eat pastelle, sweetbread and ham. Sorrel, ginger beer, ponche a crème, Peardrax still adorn tables. Festive limes still occur. We still give and receive gifts, howsoever they may have been procured. We still cook and bake and tidy and decorate and hang curtains. Some of us will parang, despite it all.

There are lessons to be learned from our traditions.

Not that we believe that, as a country, we should remain fixed in the past; that is already too much a part of our problem, as showed all year round by our politicians and their toxic qualities.

The teachings from Christmases past that we should embrace are many.

There is something to gain from returning to what used to be our sense of pure, unadulterated joy, our generosity, our kindness, our good cheer, our socialisation, our belief that each life is special, each child is worthy, no gift is too small, no gesture of love trite or insignificant.

If only we could hold on to such things and apply them to all our problems.

If only what we show – the religious and non-religious alike – in this season could be a feature of ordinary life. This is more than just a child’s wish that Christmas was not a single day.

Christmas has changed. Perhaps what that most signifies is that we, as a people and as a country, should change, too.

A merry and safe Christmas to all our readers and the nation.