Go to work on Christmas Day…

Good generals know when it is time to give up an impossible defence and seek a more secure position to hold. It is time to give up Christmas. It is now utterly overrun by the combined forces of sentimentality, irreligion, bad manners and worse taste.

I do not say that on ‘the day’, as it is now called, we shouldn’t mount the odd raid to attend church — though the same hostile forces have long been within its gates too, infantilising its liturgy, replacing its sacred music with ditties and recorders, and plastering its walls with the scrawlings and daubings of children. They are especially noticeable at Christmas. Be very careful which church you go to and at what time. There is no reason either why we shouldn’t snatch a few rations to fuel our tactical retreat, a few peppers roasted and stuffed with brandade, a mixed fry-up of partridge, teal and pheasant with broken green olives, garlic and parsley, a spot of Stilton and a few bots of Reserva. One might even manage a simple saunter in the fresh air: the countryside can be quite empty between 13.00 and 15.30 hours when They are all at the trough. But, these perfunctory observances apart, we should realise that the cause is lost, at least on this day. The 25th is no longer ours. Best really to offer to go into the office between early Mass and late dinner. And on Boxing Day too.

We need another fortress to invest and hold. St Nicholas’s day, 6 December, won’t do. It has nothing of the importance of the 25th. We need a day, or two, to have proper religion and a good blow-out with like-minded chums; more important without the noise, trash and stench of Blair’s disgusting, shopaholic, football-, youth- and sex-obsessed Britons all ‘moving forward’ all over the place.