December a joyful time for many

December is for many people a month of celebrations.

Jews celebrate Hanukkah, Buddhists celebrate Bodhi Day, many African Americans celebrate Kwanzaa, and cultures across the world celebrate the Winter Solstice.

Many people have put their hope in finding a majestical end state. For Buddhists the final Enlightenment remains the ultimate ideal, to be attained by ridding oneself of false beliefs and the hindrance of passions. For real Christians it is also important to get rid of all false teachings and to come to the purity of God’s life lessons. Though in those days of darkness there are those who want to shed false light on the Truth. They claim that God would have been born, though God is an eternal Spirit Being, having no flesh nor bones and having no birth nor death.

December, with its darkness, brings moments of reflection, thinking about life and death, family and making something of the days here on earth. Somehow, people want to let light enter in their life and want to see knowledge and prosperity to grow.

For the feasts this year it started on Dec. 8 when Buddhists the world over celebrated Bodhi Day, the day when Siddhartha Gautama, on seeing the morning star at dawn, attained enlightenment under the Bodhi Tree and became the Buddha, the “Awakened One.” Buddha’s enlightenment has for 2,500 years been the central article of faith for Buddhists of every school, sect and nationality, as well as being the unifying principle of all Buddhist teaching. For Buddhists everywhere, Bodhi Day is an opportunity to acknowledge their dedication to the principles of wisdom, compassion and kindness — the distinguishing features of the Buddhist worldview. In a similar way are Hanukkah and Christmas for many the days where kindness to others is shown, by inviting people to the table and to share food and presents.

For most of the 20^th century, there was no recognition of a December dilemma. Schools routinely marked the coming of Christmas with religious pageants, nativity scenes, and organised prayer. In many industrial countries, like in the United States of America, students of different faiths or no faith, were marginalised and excluded. Since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down school prayer in the 1960s, schools have abandoned such religious rituals, and many have struggled to develop more inclusive holiday programs.

In Belgium we see that most schools talk about Christmas as a Christian holy day, but also making other faith groups parts of those heathen celebrations of the Trinitarian Christians who celebrate 25 December as the birth of their god. Nobody seems to consider that Jesus Christ was born in October and that Santa Claus or Father Christmas has nothing to do with the Nazarene preacher who was born in Bethlehem, where there are no fir trees or Christmas trees. When you walk in the streets of Belgium you may see decorated Christmas trees with Christmas presents, in houses where Muslims live and where you can see them also having a Christmas meal.

In the second half of the previous century Christmas became so much secularised and marginalised in pursuit of multiculturalism that it can be found in all sorts of cultures in Belgium and Holland.

Buddhism is enjoying something of a renaissance at a time when a troubled planet needs kindness and compassion more than ever, and Buddhists seem to have it much easier not to partake in the commercialisation of those December festivals.

Teachers in our schools should learn to give more attention to the variety of religions and their celebrations. One way to solve the December dilemma is to focus less on December and more on the many holidays that take place throughout the year. For instance, Rosh Hashanah and Passover — two of the highest holidays in Judaism, Jeshuaism and Pesach or Passover also the most important day of the year for the real Christians or Non-Trinitarian Christians (a group much too often forgotten by the media and schools) — are seldom discussed while greater attention is given to Hanukkah because it usually falls in December. Certainly in Catholic and Protestant schools they should give more attention to the day that Jesus came together with his disciples to remember the liberation of God’s People and how he on that night of gathering with his disciples installed the New Covenant on 14 Nisan.

At the same time teachers should give those kids who have other holy days the feeling they are also recognised. The Jews and Jeshuaists should not cower. It is totally wrong to be silent about other religions. Such silence makes youngsters not know, but also allows too many false sayings about those religions to enter the main thought or political thought. Keeping Judaism quiet has never healed anti-Semitism and never built their next generation. It is part of our education that we also should people from other faiths feel welcome and have reason to stand straight in their faith. Teachers have to give Jews and Jeshuaists reason to stand proud of their rich heritage and people.

The Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which occurs at varying times of the year, also tends to be overlooked when it doesn’t fall in December. Also concerning the falling of the New Year schools could teach the children the different calendars with a different New Years day for Jews and Muslims. They also could explain why the Hijri calendar was established and what it means, explaining ‘The Hijra to Medina’ or the flight from Mecca to Medina in 622 was a turning point in Islamic history, marking the beginning of the Muslim state, and where the Arab Prophet Muhammad established the first civil Muslim society.

Learning more about these and other special and/or holidays deepens students’ understanding of their classmates, their community, and the world.

Harvard’s Pluralism Project offers a comprehensive multi-faith calendar, which can be used with Tanenbaum’s holiday planning template, to create a yearlong schedule of holidays to explore in the classroom. Teachers can connect these diverse celebrations through a thematic framework of values common to different religious and secular traditions — such as peace, caring, thankfulness, forgiveness, and renewal. For more ideas, see Tanenbaum’s Shared Visions.

For an elementary lesson that introduces a variety of winter holidays related to light, download Tanenbaum’s Rituals and Traditions about Light: Hopefulness and Waiting.

This month we come to the close of 2021. Last year we would not have thought the new year would present us again similar 2020 situations showing us how hard it was – with overflowing hospitals, with nurses and doctors exhausted, with empty streets, and with families missing family gatherings, birthdays, anniversaries graduations, bar and bat mitzvahs.

All religious groups had the difficulty that they could not come together to share their religious activities and worship. It is a pity the public television channels had previously stopped screening religious services, but luckily in this corona period, they started to send out Catholic and Protestant services. For Muslims and Jews there did not yet seem to be place. We can only hope there would come again some openness to give those religious groups also some screening time on the public broadcasting.

It is up to our education system to open the path of religious and cultural openess, showing to the kids that all people have common factors and that the differences in their culture should not be something to make us afraid, but should give us opportunities to enrich our society.

At the same time the teachers should learn those kids that it is not the material gain that is enriching us, but that spiritual matters are much more important than all those material gadgets and presents people think they have to give to show their love for someone. That way there also should be no “holiday stress” having people running in panic from one shop to another to find the right present.

In any case this period of holidays can be a challenging moment for the teachers. They can use these holidays as an opportunity to dig deeper. Go beyond how, when, and where people celebrate to why they celebrate and the many different ways they celebrate, even within the same tradition. They also should avoid monolithic representations of groups by exposing students to the lived experiences of real people, allowing them to read personal narratives, interact with guest speakers, and interview community members. By exploring the diversity within diversity, students gain a deeper knowledge of culture, history, geography, literature, art, music, and more. Just as important, they begin to see religious and cultural differences as normal and interesting.

Lessons that allow students to explore and share aspects of their identities — including their religious and cultural traditions — help them become cognisant of, and interested in, the similarities and differences that exist all around them.As they learn more about themselves, they become better prepared to learn about others. {Education Week}

Find to read: Teaching the Holidays: The December Dilemma, By Kimberly Keiserman

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Published by Marcus Ampe

Retired dancer, choreographer, choreologist Founder of the Dance impresario office and archive: Danscontact-Dansarchief plus the Association for Bible scholars, the Lifestyle magazines "Stepping Toes" and "From Guestwriters" and creator of the site "Messiah for all". - Gepensioneerd danser, choreograaf, choreoloog. Stichter van Danscontact-Dansarchief plus van de Vereniging voor Bijbelvorsers, de Lifestyle magazines "Stepping Toes" en "From Guestwriters" en maker van de site "Messiah for all". View more posts