Christmas comes with good cheer. The tragedy is the religious baggage | Polly Toynbee

As a cultural Christian, I share the goodwill. As a humanist I am glad to see archaic beliefs and damaging traditions losing their grip

This is the first Christmas since time immemorial that most people in this country are not Christians. The latest census found those identifying as Christian fell from 59% to 46% in a decade, with 8 million people shifting to no religion", which is now the second-largest English group, and the largest in Wales. The number of atheists is probably higher, as some tick the Christian box as their cultural identity, without having any religious belief. In that sense, I feel culturally Christian, so deeply imbued with its myths, paintings, hymns and parables.

But as a vice-president of Humanists UK, I celebrate any decline in superstition, any rise in those who look life and death in the eye with no expectation of anything beyond this earth.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

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