I've not watched all of it, which will of course make me vulnerable to accusations of being the sort of person who criticises things without having watched them, but I have watched most of it. The truth is, I've watched enough.

If you think that real life is like Eastenders then you'll love it. If you think that human beings are highly predictable two dimensional characters who bumble along according to modern stereotypes and expectations then you'll think it's great.

Personally, I always find these "realistic" dramatisations a bit tedious. The writers are always so keen to make the whole thing "believable" that they feel compelled to come up with reasons and explanations for everything. Nobody is allowed to do anything because they freely choose to, everybody has to do things because "that is what most people would do if they found out their girlfriend was pregnant". An explanation is given for why Mary was getting married (the priests were putting pressure on her parents) and why it was Joseph (he was the only guy available with teeth) and why Joseph took Mary to Bethlehem (her dad makes it clear that she will be killed if he doesn't).

Things happen and the cast are along for the ride.

If we are supposed to identify with the characters, we certainly can't do it at the level of "what would I have done in that situation?" we can't because the only answer to the question is "exactly the same thing, what choice would I have had?".

Nobody has any choice. It's all so tedious.

Austen Ivereigh loves it.

Many have criticised the scene where Joseph accuses Mary of adultery, I can understand the point those people are making but honestly - there is a serious case of gnat straining going on here.

The real problem with this dramatisation is far, far worse.

In the Gospel according to St Luke, Mary says "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." In the BBC nativity she does not.

This is crucial.

In the BBC version, she has no choice. In the BBC version the angel character turns up, tells her she's going to have a baby and Mary gets cries about it. "You have been chosen" says the angel but she has no choice. It's just another thing that just happens to her.

In real life, Mary said yes.

Mary's "Yes" is the arguably the most important moment in the Gospel of Luke. The birth, death and ressurection of Jesus are monumentally important, but without that "Yes" you can call off the whole show. Put away the crib and send the wise men packing because baby Jesus is cancelled.

Now you might think I'm making a bit of a fuss considering it's just one line, but the truth is that Mary's "Yes" changes everything. The BBC Mary is a victim, she was minding her own business when *wham* God makes her pregnant and she has to deal with it. The real Mary actively participates in the redemption of mankind, she says "Yes".

The wimpering BBC Mary goes to see Elizabeth because she is fretting about whether the angel thing even happened, the real Mary announced to Elizabeth that "My soul magnifies the Lord,  and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior" and "he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name".

Mary is the prototypical disciple and a model of the Church. The message of the real nativity isn't "look at all these things that happened to these poor people" but rather "look at what wonderful things happen when people say yes to God".

Every Catholic
in Pew-ville
Liked Christmas a lot...

But the Bishops,
Who lived just North of Pew-ville,
Did NOT!

It could be that their heads were not screwed on quite right.
It could be, perhaps, that their shoes were too tight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all
May have been that their hearts were two sizes too small.

"Tomorrow is Christmas!" they snarled with a snort.
"WE MUST find a way to keep Christmas short!!"

For soon they knew all the Catholics who’d lapsed,
Would come to the Church for their once a year Mass!
They would want to sing carols of shepherds and kings,
of Mary and Joseph and Jesus and things!

The Bishops don't seem to believe in such stuff,
they seem to prefer sociological fluff.
So we hear how Mary probably wasn’t a maid,
and Jesus just came to sell us Fair Trade.
The whole thing is stories, the star is a myth!
Three women would have brought more practical gifts...

"WE MUST keep Christmas short!
...But HOW?"
Then they got an idea!
An awful idea!
THE BISHOPS
GOT A WONDERFUL, AWFUL IDEA!

(An Epiphany!)

"We know just what to do!" They Laughed with a whistle,
as they pulled out their 60’s vernacular missal.
We’ll take the last day of this whole twelve day season,
the day when we all go Mass for a reason.
We’ll take that last day and we’ll move it aside.
The previous Sunday is where it will hide.

The twelve days of Christmas? Best make that eight!
The Bishops were laughing, they thought it was great.
Then they did the same thing to some other big feasts,
Like Ascension and Corpus Christi - the beasts!

A happy ending is not yet in sight,
so pray for a Christmas miracle tonight.
To melt the hearts of these grumpy old men,
and ask can we please have our feasts back again?

The Shinobi is right, this yearly "oh no Christmas is being secularised" thing is getting tedious. The fact is that the secular world is secular and has been for quite a while and frankly we ought to be used to it by now.

Every year like clockwork somebody will get upset that about "Happy Holidays" and postage stamps with snowmen on instead of holy pictures because it's not fair is it - Christmas is ours and they are playing with it!

I can't help thinking we sound like a load of spoilt little children, we've got all these toys and we never play with any of them and then the moment the other children want to play with one of them we shout "hands off!"

We secularised the Sacraments, we turned the Mass from the Holy Sacrifice at Calvary to a big meeting for a group hug. One of our toys was called Confession but we secularised that by deciding we can talk to God on our own thanks and the priest is just some bloke in a box and if he's just some bloke in a box then we might as well use the box as a dusty old store cupboard.

We filled those cupboards with old books of chant that we don't need anymore since we secularised our music. We secularised our buildings which are no longer designed to lift the mind to thoughts of heaven but rather to be practical, functional structures like secular leisure centres.

We secularised our Bishops by turning them in to faceless managerial committees with just enough authority to tie their own shoelaces so long as they get it risk assessed first and certainly not enough authority to actually reply to the letters you send them about the Holy Days of obligation that we secularised by, well, not having them.

We secularised our schools, we secularised our charities and we secularised our families. Prayer? Sacraments? Feasts? Seasons? We barely even know what they are. Lent is when people tell me that rather than fasting they "would rather do something useful". Baptism is for getting children in to schools, no wait... these days, there are no children to worry about.

Every aspect of our "religion" is almost entirely secularised. All our "toys", our feasts, seasons, songs, art, history, devotions, prayers and saints are stuffed in a dusty old box in the corner. Barely played with in years and years. We are not interested.

Then once a year in comes a toddler... They pick up the bright, shiny, exciting looking toy in the corner and the say "Happy Holidays" and we pounce on them. Mine! Mine! Mine! Get off! Get off!

The fact is that we are only interested in it because they are. If the secular world didn't pick Christmas up and shake it around, most Catholics would give it all the attention they give the Ascension of the Lord.The Bishops would move it to the nearest Sunday and in the absence of the Coca Cola advert nobody would even notice. The only reason Christmas isn't languishing at the bottom of the toy box with the Ascension is that the secular world decided to play with it.

Until we start playing with our toys, until we realise that the dusty old box in the corner is filled with wonderful gifts that were given to us by a Father who loves us and wants to share them with us, until then we have absolutely no business telling people who actually want to play with them that musn't unless they use the right name.

We can't say that Christmas is about more than just a secular celebration when we have reduced all the other parts of Christianity to be entirely secular!

By the way, I spoke to Fr Christmas this afternoon on the phone (he and I are good friends) and he said that until the Bishops reinstate the Ascension, nobody is to give them any Christmas presents - they are not on the good list.

Ho. Ho. Ho.

I know we're pushing it a bit for Christmas things (the three wise men have been and gone, twice) but I wanted to share the wonderful cake Ella made...

I think she did a great job. There are a few more photos here

My biggest regret this Christmas is that it snowed and we never built a snowman - there was a rather tragic afternoon when I took Leona to the shops to buy a sledge and they had all sold out. I am resolved. The next time I see a decent sledge in a shop I will buy three - even if it is June.

If that's the worst I can think of then you know we had a good Christmas and I hope you all did to.

It was very hard to buy Satsumas in the shops this year so when Ella put Satsumas on the shopping list I bought Clementines instead - lot's of Clementines. They were buy one get one free so I bought six bags. That's 30 or so tasty oranges.

When I got home it turned out Ella doesn't like Clementines and I have ruined her Christmas. Personally I think Clementines are far superior to Satsumas but Ella thinks they are disgusting. Eventually I went back to the shops and found some Satumas. These are kept in a seperate bag in the fruit bowl and are for Ella only while me and the girls attempt to eat loads of Clementines before they go off (fortunately, they have lasted quite well).

The important thing is that the girls found a small orange in their stocking. This is an essential part of Christmas - is this the case in other people's families or just ours?

Speaking of the girls, they are now enormous. Baby Joanne is now crawling all over the place and getting in to everything - her favourite toys are electrical outlets, plastic bags and probably barbed wire if she could get hold of it, that girl likes danger. Leona meanwhile is a little person and is definitely not a Baby (she told me), you can hold basic conversations with her and tell her off for not saying please and thank you.

Hope you had a great Christmas, I would tell you about my New Year resolutions but there are too many and I have broken several of them already.

There are loads more Christmassy pictures to be seen here.

I don't know how many of you saw the story of the ugly but safe Christmas tree in Poole...

When is a Christmas tree not a Christmas tree? When it is a giant cone covered in what appears to be green doormats.

Shoppers stared in bemusement at the mysterious object that landed in a shopping precinct in Poole, Dorset, this week. Some compared it to a giant traffic cone, a witch’s hat or a cheap special effect from an early episode of Doctor Who.

The 33ft structure turned out to be their Christmas tree, designed according to the principles of health and safety, circa 2009.

Thus it has no trunk so it won’t blow over, no branches to break off and land on someone’s head, no pine needles to poke a passer-by in the eye, no decorations for drunken teenagers to steal and no angel, presumably because it would need a dangerously long ladder to place it at the top.

[The Times]

Of course, the general public were not impressed. They said things like "I prefer a Christmas tree, not a big wizard’s hat or a lump of astroturf or something that belongs in the roadworks." and "It’s horrible. If you are going to have a fake tree then it ought to resemble a tree. You can get some really good fake trees but this is awful. It doesn’t feel Christmassy at all."

The council stood firm. The tree would definitely be staying and not moving saying: "People think you can just go into the woods, chop down a tree and put it up in the high street but if it blows over and kills someone then somebody is liable"

Fortunately, Vandalism to the rescue...

A Dorset town's much ridiculed fake Christmas tree has been replaced with a traditional conifer.

...

The Dolphin Shopping Centre donated the real tree which was put up on Tuesday morning.

Dorset police are studying town centre CCTV video to see who damaged the artificial tree.

Police said one or more individuals climbed the structure in Falkland Square and damaged its framework between 1700 GMT on 30 November and 0915 the following day. It was taken away for repairs.

[BBC]

A heartwarming tale of Christmas cheer or yet another sign of the rise of the barbarians and the impending fall of civilisation?

You decide...

Personally, I obviously don't condone mindless acts of vandalism but what about non-mindless acts? What about considered, positive (and inclusive of course) constructive acts of ugliness removal?

Maybe there is something to be learned from the thugs of Poole?

I'm just sayin...

One of the more interesting things about having children is the development of Christmas traditions. I'm not talking here about well known traditions like Christmas trees and Nativity sets, I'm talking about family traditions. For example, in the Bogle household they wash the manger.

Now that Leona is old enough to have an idea what is going on we've been making a conscious effort to create a few traditions of our own and one of these is "we always go out for a walk to gather some holly". This year was the first time.

It was a beautiful crisp winters day and we drove to the top of Brantingham hill which is one of my favourite places in the world if only because of all the memories.

I was taken there as a child with the gang from Broomfleet (aunties, uncles, cousins) and we pushed my uncle down the hill in a pram. I was taken there many times on scout hikes including a few night hikes the dark. I was taken there on a Duke of Edinburgh's Award training weekend where there was a girl called Ella that I was very fond of but afraid to say so and I came here today with Ella and our children look for holly.

I only notice now I look at the photos that Leona is wearing the exact same had that Ella wore all those years ago.

The sun was shining through the trees and making everything golden. We walked for a little while, Leona stopping as she does to examine everything including a molehill to which she pointed and said "poop" (an easy mistake to make). Eventually it happened that I stopped the pram to take a photo while Ella and Leona walked a little way ahead until Ella stopped and looked around. "Oh, very good daddy!" Ella said (calling me daddy 'cause thats what you do when toddlers are around), she thought I had stopped because of the holly bush I was stood next to (that they had walked right past) when actually I hadn't seen it either.

Mummy clipped some holly branches (no berries anywhere) and passed them to Leona who was very well gloved up (health and safety). Leona put them in big bucket we brought with us while daddy looked up and down the path nervously wondering if somebody might come along and tell us off for stealing holly.

We were careful not to take too much holly from any given bush and moved from bush to bush until eventually we had ample holly for our needs. Ella took a little more because it's always best to be safe, then we headed back to the car - but not until we'd played a little hide and seek.

On the way home we stopped for fuel and idiot daddy accidentally bought premium expensive fuel (the pumps were badly marked) which was 15p a litre more expensive but he was cheered up when we passed one of those farmhouses where they sell veg outside with an honesty box and discovered that not only do Brussels Sprouts grow on freaky alien sticks but that he could buy one for only £1.20! Despite the influence of popular culture, I actually quite like Brussel Sprouts!

When we got home mummy used green wire to tie the holly branches all around the house giving it a slight hint of the festivities to come without actually constituting decorations (not shiny, no lights) and spoiling Advent. There will be no real decorations going up until much nearer to Christmas day.

All in all we had a good time and I think Leona did too so we will definitely be doing it again next year.

I'm fairly sure I first heard this criticism from the lips of Fr Fun a few years ago but I've heard it a few times since and now the Bishop of Croydon Nick Baines (Anglican - so he's no more a Bishop than I am) asks of Away in a Manger...

"I always find it a slightly bizarre sight when I see parents and grandparents at a nativity play singing Away in a Manger as if it actually related to reality. I can understand the little children being quite taken with the sort of baby of whom it can be said 'no crying he makes', but how can any adult sing this without embarrassment? I think there are two problems here: first, it is normal for babies to cry and there is probably something wrong if they don't; secondly, are we really to believe that a crying baby Jesus should be somehow theologically problematic? Or, to put it more bluntly, is crying supposed to be sinful?"

[link]

What a moron.

It is normal for babies to cry but it is also normal for them not to cry. Babies do not spend their every waking hour crying and sometimes they simply lay there looking around and gurgling gently.

What the carol doesn't say is "this baby never cries ever" and what it definitely doesn't say is "because a crying baby Jesus wold be theologically problematic because crying is sinful." The song sets a scene: The cattle are lowing (whatever that means), the baby awakes and he doesn't cry.

I've been there, I've been a parent with a baby which simply woke up and looked around. It's a nice intimate moment and it's a nice thought that maybe Mary and Joseph had such a moment with the baby Jesus and it's not entirely unlikely. Neither of my children are God (I would have noticed) and it's happened to me a few times. No doubt there were other not so serence moments but the author of the carol chooses not to evoke them at this time. It's not a biography.

Now if all the miserable gits who can't even make up original criticisms would please naff off that would be lovely.

We decided not to try and compete with Mark and Monica's Nativity Scene this year. We don't have a horde of little nativity figures and we were not really sure where to acquire suitable moss in West Hull.

Something we were able to acquire in West Hull was fruit, brandy, icing sugar and ludicrous quantities of marzipan (four packs). So Ella has baked a rather spectacular Christmas cake and topped it with rather spectacular snowmen...

The four snowmen are singing from liquorice all sorts hymn books on which Ella has iced musical notes - each of the snowmen has a different part (base, tenor, alto and soprano) and Ella has been careful to make sure each page has the same number of beats and the appropriate clef.

She is a Christmas cake making musical nerd.

She also made use of a clever sparky-frosting technique that she learned from a kind lady in the cake shop on Boothferry Road (Ella assures me she was there to buy glycerine for the peaked icing and not to buy the cake). You can sort of see it in this photo below...

It looks spectacularly good. But as Ella said - the proof will be in the eating...

If you enjoy Christmas Trees and Puzzle Games you could do worse than play this Christmas Tree Puzzle Game!

If you enjoy totally bizarre games with no Christmas connection at all (except that James was playing it in Advent) then you could try this Wierd Moon Game!