Celebrating Christmas When You’re an Atheist

Like most people out there, especially those living in the US, I was raised celebrating Christmas; however, I was not raised with the religious background that most believe Christmas comes with. My father, as far as I know, simply does not recognize religion and my grandmother and aunt, who also played a very big role in my upbringing, are agnostic. Christmas was never a time for midnight mass or prayer, although up until a few years ago while my great-grandmother was still alive, there was a simple grace said at Christmas dinner and that was about it as far as religion playing a part in holiday festivities and even that has ceased since there is no one in my family or who gathers at our holiday meal who considers themselves a theist.

While a great deal of people will argue that if you are not religious, you have no right in celebrating the holidays, particularly Christmas. However, I think that what these people do not understand is that Christmas is not merely a holiday of midnight mass and prayer and spirituality, but also a time for family and a time for giving and also a time to truly reflect and appreciate everything that you have in your life and that is something that everyone can truly get behind, regardless of personal religious beliefs.

I recently saw a great video about a book I am now very intrigued about, The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas by Ariane Sherine. It’s a book of stories, essays, personal anecdotes and the like about Christmas and in honor of the holidays, but also with a great dose of science thrown into the mix. The reason why I really love the concept of this book is because it truly shows you what Christmas means to so many different people of so many different religious and spiritual affiliations and how it is truly a time of togetherness, peace, love, acceptance and giving. It is a time to reflect and to appreciate your life and what you have in your life.

You can check out the video that introduced me to the book below:

There is, of course, another facet of Christmas that I did not mention yet, and that is of course, rapid consumerism. Now with being raised with Christmas in a non-theist home, I was of course raised with the belief of Santa and gifts. However, also with that and staying true to the real message we are instilled with when it comes to the holidays, in addition to receiving gifts on Christmas morning, I was also reminded of the message of appreciating what we had and in regards to consumerism, what my family was fortunate enough to be capable of providing me with, which you then gain a deeper understanding of when you find out or are told that Santa never really existed.

So I guess it goes without saying at this point that I did celebrate the Christmas holiday. I spent some great time with my family and with my partner’s family and we were fortunate enough to be able to give my partner’s two young children a great Christmas. Of course the magic of the holiday was attributed to Santa, but as they get older it is my hope that they will also be able to remove rapid consumerism from their minds for a small part of their holiday as they get older to take a look around them and truly be able to appreciate their family and see how magical the holiday can be; and that goes for everyone.

My Christmas tree before the mayhem of gift unwrapping began.

I hope everyone else had a great holiday and continues to enjoy the rest of their year!

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