This Christmas, let’s practise the lessons of the coronavirus pandemic and strengthen the global community

The sheer breadth of the impact of Covid-19 has created a shared experience and global bonds which should live on even after everyone has been immunised

Samir Nazareth

Published: 6:15am, 25 Dec 2020

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While it is no secret that Christmas has been commercialised, it has also been secularised. Behind the food, festivities and fun is the fact that the festival brings together people who may not be of the Christian faith to celebrate and share.

This is the first Christmas in a long time when the environment around celebrations will be akin to the trials and tribulations Mary and Joseph faced as they prepared for the birth of their child. They were poor, alone and afraid, but there was also hope.

Millions across the world have been forced to tone down their Christmas celebrations for economic reasons, and celebrate the festival away from their loved ones to prevent the spread of the virus. But there is hope, not only because of the promise held out by vaccines but also because we have witnessed how communities and people have come together to help one another.

I am in no way romanticising the current socioeconomic crisis, nor am I giving it a religious hue. This Christmas is an opportunity to strengthen and foster what we have in common, which the pandemic has revitalised.

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We have all been affected by the pandemic. Having spread across 215 countries and territories, infecting over 78 million and claiming more than 1.7 million lives, Covid-19 has pushed the global economy into recession.

We are bound by this common experience – of losing a job, enduring a pay cut, surviving Covid-19 or knowing someone who has survived it, or died from it – and the shared knowledge of how to protect ourselves, that many of our leaders have failed us, that there are people in our midst who choose conspiracy theories over science and basic common sense, thereby threatening our survival.

We have emerged less harmed because of the help of others and the value we ourselves brought to the community, which we otherwise took for granted. As artists held impromptu concerts from their balconies, our voices escaped the isolation of our home to join others in song as we tried to find and give strength to each other. We watched hallowed stage performances online and enrolled in university courses, for free.

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Disasters and festivals create short-term communities. But the sheer breadth of the impact of Covid-19 has created a global community which should live on even after everyone has been immunised.

I have hope for this community forged in the shared experience of the pandemic. Although people across the globe have much in common, we tend to make a virtue of and glorify difference.

Take religion. Hinduism, Islam and Christianity each claim primacy because of their differences, but they all have stories of a great flood as part of their mythology. The birth stories of the Hindu god Krishna, avatar of Vishnu, is comparable to that of Jesus Christ, son of god to Christians and a prophet for Muslims.

According to these narratives, Kamsa, the king of Mathura in India, and Herod the Great, king of Judea, were threatened by the birth of Krishna and Jesus respectively. Therefore, they both tried to have the babies killed. To protect the infant Krishna, his father exchanged him with another baby, while Mary and Joseph fled to Egypt with the baby Jesus.

A child arranges a nativity scene as part of Christmas celebrations at the Jeevodaya Home for the Children in Hyderabad, India, on December 21. Photo: AFP

Fasting is important to these three religions. Christians observe Lent, Muslims Ramadan, and Hindus have a variety of occasions to fast – for example, during the festivals of Navratri and Shivratri.

Another common feature of these religions is that they convert their believers into hypocrites. Christians find it hard to accept the LGBTQ community even though one of the basic tenets of the religion is the belief that god made people in his image.

The Ummah (sense of community within Islam) mentioned in the Koran has been visibly lacking among some Muslims who do not seem to have a problem with the suppression of their Uygur brothers in Xinjiang by the Chinese government, but the world saw the power of the Ummah when Muslims protested as one over a cartoon of Prophet Mohammed.

Meanwhile, Hindus ignore the continuing heinous practice of casteism as they extol the virtues of this religion/way of life in the modern world.

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One final way these religions resemble each other is the value and importance placed on charity. However, how we came to each other’s assistance to deal with Covid-19 had nothing to do with charity, but with a sense of empathy and the fact we have all been affected by the virus.

Believers emphasise the supremacy of their religion, which tends to supersede the building of a secular community based on the parallels between religions. But the experience of the pandemic will finally bind us into a community because our experience this year has been far more homogeneous than what is offered by religion.

So Christmas 2020 is an opportunity to look beyond concerns about commercialisation and see the festival as an opportunity to strengthen and further the bonds created this year. Instead of religion highlighting our differences, we have an occasion to practise what the pandemic has taught – the need for humanity and empathy in the everyday.

Samir Nazareth has worked in the development sector and writes on sociopolitical and environmental issues. He is the author of the travelogue, 1400 Bananas, 76 Towns & 1 Million People

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