‘Put the Christ back into Christmas’: Which ‘Christ?’

Far-right leader and one of the loudest anti-migrant voices in the UK, Tommy Robinson, has urged his “Unite the Kingdom” movement supporters to join a Christmas carol concert on the 13th of December 2025 in London to “put the Christ back into Christmas.’ He wants a large-scale Christmas event as a show of national pride, saying, ‘This event is not about politics…it is about Jesus Christ – fully and completely.’ This nationalist agenda is immensely hostile to people seeking asylum and Muslims, and is rooted in xenophobia and Islamophobia.

 

The Joint Public Issues team in the UK, a partnership between the Baptist Union of Great Britain, the Methodist Church and the United Reformed Church, is offering ‘rapid resources’[1] to churches in resisting the co-option of Christian symbols for a nationalist agenda, including Christmas. Their posters ‘Christ has always been in Christmas’ and ‘outsiders are welcome’ challenge the anti-migrant campaign of the far-right during this Christmas.

 

There are twin dangers to our context today, particularly in relation to Christmas. One is the growing secularism, in which Christmas is interpreted as a ‘winter festival,’ and where market and consumerism have taken over our public sphere. The other is growing far-right extremism, where they hijack Christianity by spreading hatred in the name of faith against the other, particularly people who are seeking asylum and against Muslims, with a claim of ‘winning back Britain to Christ.’ In the present climate, we must critically examine what it means to “put the Christ back into Christmas.” Which “Christ” is being invoked in such appeals? It is certainly not a Christ in whose name hatred is legitimized, nor one whose symbols are appropriated for nationalist projects, nor one evoked merely through perfunctory declarations that “Christ is born today.” The other slogan that I hear during this season is “Jesus is the reason for this season.” But again, we haven’t reasoned out how Jesus is the reason for this season?

 

The reading from Matthew 11:2-10, which is the lectionary reading for the third Sunday in Advent 2025, is a helpful hermeneutical aid in our discussion here. John, when he was imprisoned by Herod, heard about Jesus, the Messiah’s deeds, and sent his disciples to enquire whether Jesus Christ is the one who is to come or whether they should wait for another one. Jesus could have answered a yes or a no, rather he invites John’s disciples to go and tell what they hear and see, the kind of transformation Jesus, the Messiah was offering to the people in the communities: the bling receiving their sight, the lame walking, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hearing, the dead are raising and the poor have good news brought to them. Jesus Christ’s identity is interwoven with people’s experience of transformation.

 

Jesus further says that blessed is anyone who takes no offence at him. To put this in other words, blessed is anyone who is not offended in the name of Jesus Christ.

 

Jesus could have proved his messiahship by explaining the fulfilments of the prophecies in his life, but rather, Jesus Christ’s identity is known by the deeds he does in the community, by the transformation happening in the community and by offering goodness in his name.

 

So, drawing on Jesus’ own self-accounting of his identity for his Messiahship based on his deeds of transformation is of great significance for us today in our discussion to ‘put the Christ back into Christmas.’ Which ‘Christ’ are we putting back into Christmas? It is this ‘Christ’ who self-identified himself through the liberative works of Jesus that we put back into Christmas.

 

Christ, who offers sight to the blind by opening new paths

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who makes the lame to walk by accompanying them on their ways

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who makes lepers cleansed and liberates them from stigma and discrimination

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who raises the dead by offering the hope of new life to those in bondages

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who brings good news to the poor through justice and love

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Chris,t whose name is only for love, defeating all forms of hatred and hostility

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who stands in solidarity with the margins by pitching his tent among them

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who dismantles unjust structures of oppressive systems and empires

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who strives for the flourishing of justice, peace and love of all creation

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Chris,t who receives and loves anyone and everyone non-judgmentally

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who offers sanctuary to those seeking refuge and asylum

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Chris,t who preaches and practices the values of the Kingdom of God

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who will bring down the mighty and exalt the lowly

is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who feeds the hungry, who cares for the needy

Is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

Christ, who saves all and welcomes the strangers

Is the Christ we must put back into Christmas

 

Christmas is not merely a commemoration of the birth of Jesus Christ; rather, it is an invitation to discern the ongoing birthing of Jesus within today’s contexts of vulnerability. Christmas calls us to embody the life and witness of Jesus, revealing its true meaning—love expressed in concrete action, grounded in a preferential option for the weak. It inspires us to pitch our tents alongside those in need, extending home, hope, and hospitality to all who seek sanctuary in our nation today.

The ’Bus Stop Nativity’ by Andrew Gradd[2] is a powerful image of the nativity of Jesus for our context, where Jesus is born out in the cold, in the rain, sheltered in the bus stop, identifying with the homeless people seeking shelter. Jesus is born amidst the busyness of life, at a crowded bus stop where some people are waiting for the bus to come and take them on their journeys. Jesus is born right on our street corners, in sites that we know at stations we have always journeyed from and is born right in our own neighbourhoods. Let this Christmas challenge us to find and locate the nativity in our vicinities, among the vulnerable. This image inspires us to reimagine nativity scenes relevant for our times and contexts, so that we can put back the Christ into Christmas.

 

May the peace and love of child Jesus, the prince of peace, be with us so that we resist the hijacking of ‘Christ’ from the claims of the far-right and celebrate with him in loving and caring for people who are on the margins, for the Messiah is born from within our communities.  

 

Rev. Dr. Raj Bharat Patta,

12.12.2025

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[1] https://jpit.uk/joyforall

[2] https://jpit.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/BusStopNativity.jpg

Re-reading of the Lord's Prayer in the context of Gaza famine and starvation

 

No Bombs of Terror but Balms of Healing: A Lament for Peace

 

Prayer for the victims of the AI171 plane crash

 

Prayer for Refugee Week 2025

 

For someone to come and show me the way: Faith conversations from Cold Play’s ‘We Pray’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62QAZotpBNk&ab_channel=MajesticSounds

ColdPlay, the decorated British alt-rock music band, debuted their new song “We Pray” at Glastonbury 2024. Ever since the song was released, it got the attention of the public sphere with hashtag #Wepray. Cold Play brings together four amazing artists to perform it. British rapper Little Simz, Nigerian singer Bruna Boy, Palestinian-Chilean singer Elyanna and Argentinian singer TINI featured in this song, bringing in a global multi-cultural flavour to this ‘We pray’ number. It is modern, rhythmic, very catchy and groovy. Through their singing of this song, the group is praying, or to put it in other way, the strength of prayer is in singing it in a group, in and with a global multi-cultural group.

This contemporary song prayer doesn’t speak about whom to pray or how to pray, rather is about what to pray, which offers important insights about prayer. I have always affirmed that our prayer reflects the kind of God we believe and the kind of God we believe is known by the prayer we do. In view of that, Cold Play’s “We Pray” doesn’t name the kind of God they believe, but communicates that the God to whom they are praying is about care, help, shelter, and as. someone demonstrating love in action. From my Christian subjectivity, I cannot but resonate the Christian understanding of God whom I have known in Jesus Christ being reflected in and through this song. Prayer is not an abstract theory filled with words and rhetoric, rather is about “for someone to come and show me the way” in people’s need and is about offering love to one another, which Jesus Christ has demonstrated in action through his life, ministry, death and resurrection. “We Pray” also reflects the context today as “though I am in the valley of the shadow of death” from Psalm 23, informing that from God the shepherd there is comfort and care, for prayer is about love.

 

Praying about “Virgilio” and “Baraye” in the song, brings out the very essence of praying for the people and movements seeking justice in our world today. “Virgilio” is an immigrant who was wrongly accused of killing a police officer in the US and “Baraye” which in Farsi means “Because of" is a song in the context of a woman who was unjustly sentenced for wearing hijab wrongly in Iran shows their sensitivity and longing for a just world. Perhaps prayer is about grounding and working with struggles of justice for liberation. Prayer is about joining with the God of liberation for justice in our world today.

 

“We pray” is also a bold attempt to communicate that life is all about living it well with confidence, striving for a world well lived with respect, with dignity and with love. For it is about living well until the “end of the day” and waiting in hope for an unknown future where there is no pain and is so amazing. Prayer is about a realistic hope that comes at the end of the day.

 

Let us join in singing with Coldplay “We Pray” praying that “for someone to come and show me the way, for some shelter and records to play, we’ll be singing ‘baraye’, and pray that we make it to the end of the day. Thanks to Cold Play for bringing in the importance of prayer into the public sphere. May this song help us to prayerfully listen to it so that we can listen God's voice and become an answer to someone's prayer.

 

@rajpatta,

29.09.2024

Does Jesus haunt you? Reflecting on ‘Jesus the haunting John’ from Mark 6:14-29

 In my childhood, many ghost stories were taking rounds in our locality, for it was said that people who have died with their desires unmet would come as ghosts and haunt people who have ill-treated them when they were alive. I am not sure of the authenticity of ghosts moving around, but it was strongly believed in the community that they haunted people. Back in our village I remember some people cook the favourite food of their dear ones who have died on their death anniversary, and place a bowl of that food near their photo with a belief that they come and taste it, in a way to say that they are still with them and celebrate their presence around them.

The text this week from Mark 6:14-29 is one such passages, where king Herod was haunted by the memories of John, and eventually identifies Jesus as the risen John, whom he beheaded and is now raised. This is the only text in the New Testament where a birthday of a person is mentioned, which was the birthday of king Herod. This again explains the colonial trappings of that context, for only kings afforded to celebrate birthdays, for only such people’s lives mattered and their births were deemed important. It was only the birthdays of the powerful people that the communities are called to remember and therefore Herod’s birthday party is recorded here in this text. It might not be out of context here to mention how the wedding celebrations of a son of one the richest persons in the world are being celebrated with pomp, glamour and glitters where celebrities from across the world are attending now in India. These lavish weddings are to demonstrate the wealth and power these rich families hold in the world, for they are displaying that they can buy anything and everything with the power of money they have. The jarring opulence of the billionaire Ambani wedding for his heir signifies the rise of oligarchs in the world, and how the world’s powerful people fall at their feet exhibiting the inequality in India.[1] It is sickening to read the news about their filthy rich weddings as headliners on major national and international media, in a context where majority of the world’s poor are being exploited in India.

Herod throws a birthday banquet for his court officials, and when Herodias daughter dances and pleases his guests, Herod offers this girl to ask anything as a gift, even half of his kingdom to give. Herodias uses her young girl to ask for the head of John the baptiser on a platter as a gift, for John spoke truth to the powers (18v), for which Herodias hated John for. Herod yields to it and beheaded John and gave it to her on a platter.

Against this backdrop, when Jesus’ name was spreading across the region for his transformative powers and works among the people, Herod and his court officials on hearing about Jesus, tried to identify who this Jesus was. There were at least four different identifications made at Herod’s court on learning about Jesus.

Firstly, some said that John the baptiser has been raised from the dead; and for this reason, these powers were at work in Jesus (14v). Raising from the dead was not a new concept in the religious world view of those times in Palestine, and so when Jesus was performing his works of healing and speaking truth to the powers, they thought that either Jesus was the new John, or Jesus had the spirit of John in him and so was able to do the kind of works that he was doing.

Secondly, some others said that Jesus was Elijah (15a), who was one of the prominent prophets of the Hebrew Bible, who did not see death as he was ascended into heaven. Perhaps the wisdom of Herod’s court believed that Jesus was that Elijah who again descended into their midst to perform powerful acts of healing and transforming their communities.

Thirdly, others said that Jesus is a prophet, like one of the prophets of the old (15b) who continued his prophetic ministry of teaching, healing and contesting the powers and principalities of his times.

Fourthly, when Herod heard of Jesus, he was haunted by the memories of John the baptiser, and particularly how he cruelly beheaded him and said Jesus was “John, whom I beheaded, and has been raised” (16v). For Herod, Jesus is the haunting John, bringing him those memories of arresting John, binding him and putting him in the prison and even reminding him of the guilt of beheading John for speaking truth to his wife Herodias.

Mark also records that Herod feared John for he was a righteous man, and whenever he heard the prophetic voice of John, though he was perplexed but always like to listen to him (20v), which is to say that in that being haunted by John, Herod felt challenged. So this episode of Herod being haunted by John in Jesus has theological and missiological implications for us today in our Christian discipleship.

“Jesus, the haunting John” is not the affirmed Christological titles of Jesus Christ that the church recognises today. But on reflecting this text, I recognise the need for this title to be acknowledged and celebrated in our contexts today. For “Jesus the haunting John” challenges those in power to know that the risen Jesus is like a mirror granting people an opportunity to reflect the historical and contextual injustices offering a space to seek forgiveness and in striving for justice as a way forward. “Jesus the haunting John” acts like a scale for people in being accountable to the kingdom of God, where truth, love and justice thrives. “Jesus the haunting John” also informs the faith communities that there is a continuation of God’s mission from John to Jesus and even forwards where you and I are called to carry it forward again in the interest of the kingdom of God.

Unfortunately, Herod though recognised that Jesus is the haunting John in his life, who has come back to life from the death, continued his life in collaboration with the colonial powers without any repentance in his life. Herod for the lust of his power played a huge role towards the crucifixion of Jesus as a public criminal.

On recognising “Jesus as the haunting John,” Herod recognised that Jesus has come as a new-being, continuing the mission of John the baptiser, in fact with more power, which includes contesting the colonial powers, healing and loving people. John the baptiser said about Jesus at his baptism, that the one coming after him is more powerful, and to that extent Jesus carried on more powerful acts of mission, preaching, inaugurating and practising the kingdom of God over against the kingdom of Rome. Jesus’ mission of contestation can also be understood in the way he was critical of Herod and even using the ‘f’ word which was “the fox” (Luke 13:32).[2]

“Jesus as the haunting John” is also a title that reminds the listeners that prophets keep haunting people & communities who are engrossed in doing unjust acts. Jesus has come to make this world a better place, a transforming place and a ‘new creation’, by speaking truth to the powers and by being prophetic, which is ‘good news to the poor as bad news to the rich.’ Christian discipleship is all about grace, and it is grace that calls people to repentance and to walk humbly with God, which is to get busy in doing acts of love and justice.

“Jesus the haunting John” also serves as a precursor to discuss Jesus’ resurrection, for Herod recognises that ‘Jesus is the risen John’ who has come back to life from the dead. For this very reason, I think there is no mention of Jesus appearing to the powerful people after his resurrection, including Herod, for to Herod Jesus always remains to be haunting John. Perhaps that could be the reason that Herod played his part to get rid of Jesus who was haunting John, by playing his role in the criminal execution of Jesus on the cross.

The relevance of this text is that Jesus is the one who exposes one’s unjust acts, and the name of Jesus is the name that haunts people till they seek forgiveness and turn away from evil doings. The name of Jesus is the haunting Grace that haunts us to lead a just life, overcoming injustice, inequality and indignity. The name of Jesus haunts us till we deliver justice. At the General Synods and Conference meetings of the churches, they have come forward to express ‘full and unreserved apology’ to all the past historical mistakes they have made including the past safeguarding cases of abuse, for the experiences of racism, for exclusion of people in the name of caste, colour, gender, sexuality in the church etc. which is invoking the name of Jesus into the life of the church.

In such a context what is the meaning of the name of Jesus today? A mere apology is not sufficient, for the name of Jesus calls for action, calls to exercise justice. The name of Jesus is a name of love, grace, hope, justice, equality, peace and at the same time the name of Jesus is also contesting and defeating hate, injustice, inequality, prejudice, pride, privilege, exclusion, and discrimination. Is Jesus haunting us in your faith? If yes, Jesus is inviting us to grace by overcoming complacency and evil deeds which we succumb to, and drives you to work for peace, love and justice in every way possible.

If Jesus is the haunting John, the significance of this title for us today is to be inspired for us to be haunting Jesus to people & communities around. As churches are we named, branded called and lived as “Church, the haunting Jesus” in our communities today? This text challenges us to be “Christians, the haunting Jesus” where we haunt the world around us with the values, life, mission and ministry of Jesus Christ and strive for a transformed planet.  

On this second Sunday in July which we observe as ‘Action for Children’ Sunday in the Methodist church in the UK, the name of Jesus is haunting us to recognise that there are many vulnerable children across the world, and we are called to join in addressing their needs in ensuring life in all its fullness. The name of Jesus should inspire us to work towards addressing hunger and thirst in our world and strive for a just world. In the context of growing caste oppression and increasing religious fundamentalism, we are called to be and become people of God haunting in the name of Jesus, challenging the oppressive structures and strive for the liberation of all. In the context of displaying opulence and wealth at the expense of exploiting the poor, the name of Jesus will continue to haunt the rich and greedy people to give up their privilege and share their resources in building a just society. Does Jesus haunt you?

May the name of Jesus haunt each of us to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with God. Jesus is the haunting John, and the risen Jesus is the haunting grace in the Holy ‘ghost.’ Amen.

 

Raj Bharat Patta,

12th July 2024