'tis the Season

It has always interested me that the Christ in Christmas is ignored, or at best downplayed significantly, by so many Australians. There are some people of other religious faiths who naturally do not celebrate Christmas. Then there are the majority of Australians who do celebrate Christmas, but would describe themselves as not religious. The latter often use the line "I have my own beliefs".

What is particularly curious is the deliberate exclusion of Christ from Christmas. Someone recently said to me that Christmas had nothing to do with religion. She meant for her personally, but it sounded so dismissive that it made me wonder. I understand if people don't want to emphasize the religious aspect of Christmas. If they do not want to acknowledge that the birth of the single most influential person ever is personally significant; fair enough. However you can't say it is not important. To deny the poignancy of this historical event, and its subsequent, and continuing impact on billions of people seems a bit ludicrous. Whatever else it may be to people, Christmas, as the name suggests, is patently about the birth of Jesus Christ. To say otherwise, is insulting and offensive.

There are number of universal values which are associated with Christmas aside from overtly religious ones. Omitting the few Grinches who dwell among us, most people, Christian or not, recognize the Christmas season as a time for family and friends, for giving and receiving, and a time for relaxing and reflecting. We all desire peace and we wish others well. There is a spirit of generosity and hospitality, a kind of communal bonhomie which permeates life, from the workplace to the market place, to our homes and neighbourhoods. It is a happy time, and a hopeful time for most people.

Generally, people will give the same basic answer to the question, "What does Christmas mean for you?" so it makes perfect sense to me, in identifying these common values, to also acknowledge their source. Values do not originate in vacuums. Are Christmas values not also Christian values, or religious values? Or do they spring from the hearts of men, as humanists would have us believe. What is the origin of faith, and hope and love? Where do these cherished and indispensable qualities come from? Are they human or divine?

Photo sources:
http://madjank.com/religious-christmas-cards-photo-wallpaper-hd-of-christmas/
http://www.commentscod.com/comments/religious-merry-christmas-graphics-picture/4

Smarter Devils

Why do we teach others, and learn things for ourselves? Why is education so highly esteemed by the majority of people, in a majority of cultures, in a majority of countries? Why do we speak of educated men and women as though they are better than uneducated men and women? Do we truly believe that more knowledge is the answer to the world's problems? Are we learning more and doing more? Are we knowing more and loving more?

Knowledge is not the ultimate goal of education. The Bible says that knowledge "puffs" a person up with pride when it is pursued as an end in itself. If then, education should be a means to an end, what is it we are attempting to achieve? What is the end?

Humanists believe that increases in knowledge lead to improvements in society. The more we know, the better able we are to avoid problems or to fix them when we can't dodge them. Education makes people better and therefore leads to a better, more efficient, more caring, more peaceful society. That's the theory. Reality tells a different story. But even allowing for this beautiful albeit Utopian ideology, I want to ask why. What is the point of striving for the betterment of mankind? Why bother? Don't say education is a universal right. It may well be, but that is not an answer to the question. In fact, it only leads to another question about the basis for human rights.

The fault in the argument put forward by Humanists and arrogant athiests like Dawkins is that it has no moral foundation. Humans are intrinsically moral, and to remove morality from education is to render the latter, an exercise in futility. Education does not produce angels but rather, as C.S.Lewis puts it, "education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make a more clever devil."

All education should have as its goal, the edification of mankind which is itself ultimately for the Glory of God. God has given me a brain so I should use it to learn and grow but I must also share and apply my knowledge to help and encourage others; not to become better people but to recognize their need for God. To accept weakness and failure is to become complete. The purpose of life is to know God and to make Him known. Education alone will never achieve this objective, never fulfill this purpose, and it will never make the world all right. The world is all wrong and education is only a treatment, not a cure.