Wednesday, September 25, 2019

Feast of Stephen revisited

As Christmas seems to be speeding towards us once again – with all the hope it holds out for the survival of the embattled retail sector, it got me thinking. I once had a friend whose birthday was on Boxing Day – as you can imagine, this made her less than happy.

Italian doughnuts with sugar.

At the same time, I had long been fascinated by the Christmas carol ‘Good King Wencelaus’. This is not because I have any sort of religious attachment to Christmas. For me it’s one of the great secular celebrations of Australian life. Those whingers who complain that Muslims want to stop us celebrating the true message of Christmas have obviously not realised that commercial imperatives have already achieved that. Easter only just has time to finish before we are hearing about the looming approach of Christmas. The only thing more cynical is the way Mothers Day was manufactured to sell more greetings cards.