Tag Archive for: consumerism

Offended by the M&S Merry Pigmas cards?

We shouldn’t be taken aback that Christ is being airbrished out of Christmas, says James Mildred. But the future of Christianity is God’s business. Ours is to share the good news and show the love of Jesus.

Here is a short excerpt from the article. Read the full article here…

A few years ago, a survey showed that less than one per cent of Christmas cards had religious themes. While stores displayed hundreds of different options, only a handful featured the traditional Christian nativity. Morrisons was the worst offender. Second worst was Tesco.

This year, Marks and Spencer have caused anger with their Percy Pig-themed charity Christmas cards and money wallets, which replaced the world ‘Christmas’ with ‘Pigmas’. Author Laura Jansson took to Twitter to complain, asking whether M&S would replace the name of another religion’s prophet with ‘pig’ for a laugh.

If you were to ask me whether I think Christmas is being airbrushed of any actual Christian content, I’d say yes! But why should we be surprised by that? It’s simply a reflection of where we are as a society. We’re now swimming in very dark waters. God’s word tells us that when a society gives up on God, as an act of judgement, God gives it over “to do what should not be done” (Romans 1:28).

Thankfully, the future of Christianity does not rest on inaccurate portrayals of ‘traditional’ nativity scenes on Christmas cards that are often more the product of human imagination than fact. The future of Christianity is, ultimately, God’s business. It is far better that we get on with proclaiming the good news, being salt and light and demonstrating the love of Christ in a whole variety of ways – and do so with profound thankfulness that for all the pressures, we are still remarkably free to preach Christ.