by Raj Patta.
Far-right leader and one of the loudest anti-migrant voices in the UK, Tommy Robinson urged his “Unite the Kingdom” movement supporters through a Christmas carol concert on the 13th of December 2025 in London to “put the Christ back into Christmas.’ He intended this large-scale Christmas event to be 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 against 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 has offered ‘rapid resources’[1] to churches in resisting the co-option of Christian symbols for nationalist agenda including Christmas. Their posters ‘Christ has always been in Christmas’ and ‘outsiders are welcome’ challenged the anti-migrant campaign of the far-right during this Christmas. Before we move on into the season of Epiphany, let us pause to reflect on these issues which have looked large during Christmas this year.
There are twin dangers to our context today, particularly in relation to Christmas. One is the growing secularism where Christmas is interpreted as ‘winter festival,’ where market and consumerism has 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 those who are seeking asylum and against Muslims, with a claim of ‘winning back Britian 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 heard again during this year is “Jesus is the reason for this season.” But again, have we really reasoned out how is Jesus the reason for this season?
The Advent readings about John the Baptist can be 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 should they wait for another one (Matthew 11:2-10). Jesus could have answered a yes or a no, but 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 interweaved with people’s experience of transformation. Jesus further says that blessed is anyone who takes no offense at him. To put this in other words, blessed is anyone who is not offended in the name of Jesus the 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.
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 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 a 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 us pray that this Christmas message continues to challenge us, as we begin 2026, 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, and to 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.
Theology Everywhere 