TMI: The lost meaning of Christmas... by David KL Quek

The lost meaning of Christmas — David KL Quek

January 04, 2011

“And so this is Christmas

For weak and for strong

For rich and the poor ones

The world is so wrong

And so happy Christmas

For black and for white

For yellow and red ones

Let's stop all the fight

A very merry Christmas

And a happy New Year”

— John Lennon, “Happy Christmas (War is Over)”

Christmas message transcends glitzy commercialism
Christmas for me is mostly about family, and a timely reflection upon the deeper religious significance when Jesus Christ was born more than 2,000 years ago.

It is also the time to ponder on the year that has been, and envisage what the coming year would hold in store for us personally, but more importantly for Malaysians as a whole — because we are at the cusp of something phenomenal and momentous, of possible change towards a manifestly different but better, more mature society.

My family and I had been away in Singapore for a few days, away from almost all communications — no unnecessary SMSes, no emails, no Facebook or Twitter, no work connections, almost no newspapers or TV, by choice. I persuaded my family to stay off the electronic roaming grid and thus, disengage from our ubiquitous connectedness. It was good to be detached although only for a few short days, as we welcome in the New Year of 2011.

But alas back in Malaysia, ushering in the New Year appears to have swept along yet unsettled and unsettling issues on the sociopolitical front, not an auspicious beginning for a much astrology-commentated “challenging” year ahead.

Upon reaching home soil, I am therefore aghast to hear that there had been “overzealous” moves to “de-Christianise” Christmas to enable and prettify the so-called Christmas visit of the PM to “celebrate” this festivity with Christians. (“Najib, apologise for un-1Malaysian directive”)

I suppose, it did not cross the minds of our non-Christian bureaucrats that it is meaningless and inane to even suggest that this politically-charged visit be void of all possible misinterpretable religious connotations. Hence, the now disavowed “directive” that the symbolisms of Christianity (i.e. the iconic crosses/crucifixes, the hymns and carols reflecting the Christian beliefs) be subtracted from the celebrations just to appease some political parochialism and skewed “religiose” correctness.

Minus Jesus Christ, there is no Christmas significance, lest there continues to be some less-than-subtle move to downgrade the faith held by some one-quarter of the world’s population, albeit held by just some nine per cent of our Malaysian citizens.

But I agree that the glitzy secular images of snow and reindeer, Santa Claus and presents, turkey, pudding and eggnog, poinsettias and mistletoes — all these increasingly gratuitous celebrations have permeated the global understanding of this festivity, if indeed this is the distorted message of the new and now.

Sadly, the religious message is increasingly difficult to decipher apart from all the extraneous commercial noises which fog over the true meaning of this singular event. The consumerist buying sprees and sales, the Christmas trees and decorations, the glitzy partying are but secular distractions.

I suppose when one is younger, Gen X and Y, all these have special appeals to usher in a Dionysian respite of fun and games. But that said, it is not necessarily the “wet-blanket” approach that most middle-aged or “mature” generations should enshroud themselves with, in grim joyless austerity.

Because the music, the carols and hymns, the biblical message, the pleasure of the gift-giving and sharing, the peaceful connotation so attached to the meaning of Christmas, are a joyful expression of the message intended to further enhance if not embellish the true gist of the “holiday” season — but these should not be the “be all and end all” of this celebration.

Essentially, Christmas time should dictate a renewal of faith as well as a renouncement of evil and sin. Basically this is at the personal level, a call to forgiveness, a return to godliness and a promise of faith keeping, to acknowledge the goodness and authority of a Higher Being.

It is also time to remind ourselves of our human nature, our imperfections, our proclivity to error-filled ways and our inherent sinfulness, and a resolve to aspire to be better than our human weaknesses and foibles would allow us, or tempt us to be otherwise.

Because in all honesty, we are all more likely to be less than good — given that totally unrestrained morals, or lack of which, to choose! We are oftentimes also driven by innate selfish motives, and we are prone to be less than kind to others, than we can or should be. But, as is always enjoined by most other religions, humanity has always been urged to behave and do better than their baser selves, that we can do better…

“Agape” a selfless love for others, expressed without ulterior or selfish reasons is that fundamental gift and message of Christians. Above all we are exhorted to be more human and humane, to work towards peace, to be better national and global citizens, and we are entreated to champion unreservedly for human rights and dignity for all, especially the underserved, the unjustly treated, the indigent and the marginalised, i.e. those who have so much less by virtue of fate or circumstances… to walk in the shoes and spirit of Christ.

Time out for reflection
I treasure this time of the year for winding down — the pent-up tensions, the ratcheted-up rhetoric, discordant disagreements, combative battles of wits and wills, brutish alpha male infighting, ad hominem attacks and more; all these need a specially apportioned but assured space and time to dissipate, to simmer down a few notches…

I suppose it would be unrealistic to expect that all human interactional misunderstandings and tensions become fully dispelled with just time and natural forgetfulness… Yet, it is good to reduce such “heated up” moods so that cooler or lukewarm sentiments are better than the blistering boils which can cause so much unintended or even intended harm and injury.

Like a recurrent active volcano, its sporadic eruptions need always that intermittent dormancy to rebuild its tamped down volatilities and energies, which while so potentially destructive its consequential lava flows can also be so enriching and fertile, otherwise…

So I cherish this perforce moment of quietude, by opting for a much-needed vacation from the daily “drudge” of work, toil, duties and “responsibilities” or even communication.

Lest we wish to remain forever trapped within the clutches of never-ending grind of day-to-day humdrum affairs, we all need to chill out, to take a break, to time out for some much needed freedom from work, to be able to reminisce and ponder even if for a little while, even if for the simplest distracted thoughts — if for nothing else to be able “to stand and stare”.

Serious burnout and boredom can etch psychological scars on our crowded fatigued minds. I believe we would perform the worse for it, if we let these psychological millstones weigh down or becloud our vision, our purpose in our individual lives.

For many of us though, we are so embroiled in the work of the living that we could not easily extract ourselves from its claw hold of remaining connected, of wishing to remain relevant, constantly on top of things, in our small if ephemeral niches of our increasingly hyper-segmented lives...

Thus, it is not surprising that one finds it very hard, even well-nigh impossible, to be totally cut off from the world: the ever-present background noises, the incessant sound bites, the strangle-hold of constant connectedness of the mobile phone, the emails, the tantalising yet very tenacious stickiness of the internet, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Perhaps many of us think we are more than what nature has in store for us humans, that we have a greater or more meaningful impact on others around us. Perhaps we do, but then again these are in some mostly trivial, fleeting and inconsequential moments and ways, in hindsight — mostly petty to the point of insignificance.

Overcoming our apathy
Some of us of course prefer the close comfort of home and our own cloistered world of just a few — believing that we do not need to be too involved in the world out there, with all its changeable and discordant political or social clatter. Somehow, we would quietly get along and simply work for our own families, our close-knit circle of friends, our own interests (and be damned with the world!).

But we also choose to moan and groan on asides, while choosing to remain grimly dumb when it truly matters, we let injustice and wrongdoings perpetuate in a complicit acceptance of status quo, too timorous to even contemplate any divergent action to improve or counteract these transgressions.

At other times, we overplay our roles and overstep the boundaries of propriety, and we get hardboiled into believing in our own superiority, our own self-importance. We shout and we rant hatefully, particularly in nameless blogs and commentaries, but anonymously, as if these would suffice to influence events in some way or other.

Sometimes we are just indifferent and we couldn’t care less, the Mr Hyde overcoming the Dr Jekyll within us.

This converse reaction however, more often than not, stifle us into stagnant morasses of inactivity and fearful non-action when faced with hurdles or challenges, mostly because we are unmoved or simply feel too hopeless and helpless to do something. Our greatest weakness is to remain apathetic, subsuming to a culture of the “silent majority” or worse, to that overarching Mammon of all-consuming personal self-interests and personal gain.

Christmas is that special time to rekindle the humility, which would make us that much more caring, kindlier and compassionate. And yet we are reminded to be more proactive and find the inner strength to act more unwaveringly toward a greater good and become more socially engaged.

We must emerge from our blasé attitude. We must temper our profit motive, our baser instincts towards callous personal gain at all costs, and a deteriorating regard to society’s expected generosity and altruism towards the less endowed.

But although most of what we do unfortunately have very little long-term impact on society and others; we must not let this mindset stifle our zeal for doing more. Our influence on an individual basis may be less than meets the eye, but collectively as a united group, we may exert a stronger consequence than we believe maybe possible.

It is certainly not the case of “half empty” vs “half full” perspective of the world around us, but bare-bones realism. Some of us are habitually more sedate and pessimistic than others, some more cynical, while a smaller number subscribe to a more optimistic and “feel-good” attitude.

We need to infuse ourselves with greater belief in being able to bring about change for the better! If we wish to leave bigger imprints on society, we do have to commit to some paradigmatic shift, to engage more forcefully and more steadfastly into causes, which can then be better addressed for larger segments of our society. We need to act.

Every Malaysian must believe in and partake of change that we wish for, but we must all do our part and continue to nudge the momentum of the art of the possible, no matter the distracting noises, the occasional internal bickerings and diversions, which seem to hamper our ultimate objectives!

What next 2011?
The year 2010 is over, and 2011 is upon us.

Uncertainty with a dash of cautious optimism seems to permeate the Malaysian psyche. The scent of a snap general election is in the air. Yet, there is so much “static” and simmering ethnic and religious tension that seems to charge the Malaysian political atmosphere.

Malaysians are repeatedly reminded that political change risks the unknown, with cynical “warnings” for choosing incumbency, or face possible consequences including social unrest! But what sort of “same old, same old” politics and administration, are we asked to choose from? There has been so little transformative change in our 53-year-old governing parties that we are asked once again to believe in their “righteous” largesse to deliver more of the same!

Most of the touted transformative plans and programmes are glitzy and slogan-heavy, but they remain nebulous and laden with concepts, which have not been fully articulated or formulated to encompass many of our concerns and misgivings.

We seek greater transparency and dialogue to improve our debilitating civil administrative systems, our police, our judiciary, so that together we can achieve more than what has been simply planned or articulated as lip service. We need greater but necessary oversight of experience or scrutiny or input from other “out-of-the-box” stakeholders — which means that most of us need to participate as civic-minded citizens more fully and without fear or favour.

We are alarmed that the government appears to be whittling down its commitment to social development programmes — our subsidies on fuels and foods, utilities, healthcare and social safety net allocations from tax revenues, have been reduced. Such civic obligations have been increasing with most other countries around the world, through greater productivity, care and prudence in use of public funds and taxes, and with less leakages and wastage. We seem to be doing the reverse.

We worry as to the gradual passing of the buck back to consumers and taxpayers, who would be once again be made to accept higher payment instruments to help defray an ever bigger and more bloated public administrative budget. We worry that the much-needed tax subsidies for social development and healthcare would be gradually removed to further burden the poorest and the middle class, whose disposable incomes and savings for retirement are already hugely inadequate.

We worry that the poorest 40 per cent of the population would be left once again marginalised, to accept bare minimum public products, utilities and services, without systematic social safety nets such as minimum wage, unemployment benefits, affordable housing, liveable retirement pensions, catastrophic social health insurance such as Medicare, Medicaid or CHIPs or whatever.

Yet we all aspire to be better — to reach the 2020 goal of a developed nation with per capita income of some US$15,000 or more. We need to beat the so-called middle-income trap, but we appear to be least prepared for the obligatory sacrifices and the mandatory leap in productivity — so elusive for most Malaysians these past few decades.

We need to prod our population to do more, now and continue to improve all the time, to keep up with the highly competitive world out there. We cannot afford to be bogged down by petty and nonsensical parochial interests and partisan prejudices and rhetoric, which destroy the fabric of our fragile unity amidst our increasingly touchy mindsets.

We must strive to work together to be better than one ethnic or religious fraternity alone — collectively we should be better than one, in the true spirit of “1 Malaysia”, or a “Bangsa Malaysia”, or whatever name to go by! But this must not be an empty slogan, a meaningless rehashed discordant shibboleth, which rings hollow, when one does not walk the talk!

No one wishes to be left behind; no one wishes to lose this unforgiving strife for advancement and one-upmanship. Yet, we must actively find more meaning and purpose in our lives, to enhance the social and development goals for all Malaysians — we simply need to strengthen and inculcate our competitive and entrepreneurial skills!

We can do better to help reduce, even eradicate poverty, enhance living skills and standards including healthcare and quality of life, and abolish social ills such as pervasive corruption, street crimes, and sociopolitical injustice.

We must rid our mindsets from glaring ethnic and religious bigotry and intolerance, which distract from our national objectives. We must not let contemptuous shrill groups hijack our Malaysian national goal by raising hateful prejudice and racist rhetoric, which destroys the confidence and the patriotism in the non-Bumiputera citizens and the international community to return, to work productively, to remain and to invest and re-invest in this country, our country too.

Thomas Friedman, New York Times columnist and author, argues that Americans have “to postpone gratification, invest for the future, work harder than the next guy and hold their kids to the highest expectations.” Otherwise, he says, the country will be unable to keep up with China and other emerging economies. This aptly applies to us Malaysians in more ways than others! We must and can do better!

Our national psyche and our collective belief in ourselves as a nation is now at one of its lowest ebbs. We cannot be distractedly locked in internecine infighting, while the rest of the world rolls ahead!

Ah, Christmas time is that time for thought, for reappraisal, for re-aligning our purposes and goals — most importantly, to refocus on our lives and clarify our individual and collective purposes. Are we ready to invest in the future for all Malaysians, or just for the one or few?

May the year 2011 be an especially meaningful, prosperous and love-filled one for everyone! Happy New Year!

* Dr David KL Quek reads The Malaysian Insider.
* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication. The Malaysian Insider does not endorse the view unless specified.