Why Christmas is for everyone | Julian Baggini

An atheist's Christmas celebrates hospitality and generosity - just like a Christian's

Although I'm a card-carrying atheist, I have some sympathy with those who argue that a Christmas without Christ or a mass is as meaningless as celebrating a birthday without a birth, or a jubilee without a coronation.

However, traditions have a habit of breaking free from their roots. Nobody is calling for Saturday or Wednesday to be renamed because we no longer worship Saturn or WAden, the Roman and Norse gods who gave the days their names. The fact that hundreds of years ago our pagan midwinter festival was refashioned and renamed after Jesus does not give Christianity ownership of it in perpetuity.