2020 - The Year the Christmas Card Died

Quite a lot of things died in 2020, not the least being the traditional Christmas Card.  We sent none and received five, which both surprised me and shouldn’t have surprised me. 

I am not sure whether to mourn the loss or think – about time, inevitable, or something else altogether?

It wasn’t long ago, comparatively, that we received scores of cards, and each year exceeded the previous.  That was, until it no longer did; maybe that was the height of my short-lived popularity?

I must admit to enjoying reading the cards.  People said kind things as well as the perfunctory (it being Christmas) but most wrote something with meaning, albeit in shorthand. 

Even though there may be better ways to express ourselves the Christmas card had its value, which sufficed in a busy world.  At very least they said: we are celebrating the joy of Christmas with you, we are thinking of you, and in some cases, we are praying for you.  Can’t fault that. 

Increasingly, over the last decade, people have cut back on cards, and in place sent family email photoshoots, which whilst cute enough in themselves are hardly the holy family, are they? Airbrushing and recaps of the year became more popular.  Jesus didn’t stand a chance.

Christ was the one Christmas was centred around.  Cards and stamps were printed in commemoration of his holy birth.  Churches filled and people sang carols with gusto.  Good will was actually evident.  Something holy, something beautiful, was still in the background of the reason for the season. 

Not so much today, where nativity scenes have been banned due to their exclusivity and alleged offence to multicultural communities.  Christ-mas is becoming Innocuo-mas.

Christmas cards have gone the same way – less about Jesus Christ, less about the marvel of the manger, and consequentially, less about mankind’s desperate need for a saviour. 

More about images of Claus, elves, and snow – a Disneyesque invasion of poorly conceived and banal imagery.  Where are the great Masters? 

I guess they have gone the same way as Christmas cards – relegated to the past, where the past is always inferior to the present.  Really?

I suppose if we are to kill meaning the things that pointed to it are going to get the chop as well?

No more Christmas cards from me.  I’m making a stand.

Although, if truth be known, I had gotten tired of sending cards to my own children and never getting cards in return.