Christmas is for everyone

Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, the Conservative and Muslim peer who, along with Labour's Lord Ahmed helped free British teacher Gillian Gibbons from a Sudanese jail earlier this month, has today written a piece in the Sunday Telegraph emphasising that Christmas is a celebration for everyone in Britain regardless of religion.

She says: "Christmas is a time to recognise the contribution that Christianity has made (and continues to make) to the nation, even if one does not share the religion. For too long, multi-culturalism has ignored the majority culture, which still is Christian."

As someone who has, personally, been disturbed by the attempts by a handful of, I suppose well-meaning but completely misguided people and institutions to not mention Christmas presumably to avoid offending Britain's other religious (and indeed non-religious) communities, I very much welcome Baroness Warsi's comments. As she points out:

"The annual campaigns to downgrade Christmas are rarely spearheaded, or even supported, by Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh or other religious groups."

Multiculturalism appears to have been warped by some into requiring everyone to observe some bland atheism that is both oppressive and zealous. 2007 may - just may - have been the year where this stifling political correctness began to be seriously challenged and turned back.

In that vein, a very happy Christmas to everyone in Putney, Roehampton and Southfields.

You can read Baroness Warsi's article here.