Christmas with religiously and ethnically diverse with community

[mids2019]

So I work in a trust where possibly 20% of staff are Muslim and there are plenty of other religions represented too with some Christians .

This year with the traditional Christmas parties and general Christmas build up there have been conversations about our holiday period being centred around one religion to the detriment of others. There are no bank holidays associated with Eid or Diwali and people for instance.

I think in general people do get in the general communal Christmas spirit but for instance the traditional meal and drinks which is meant to be a celebratory time for staff has maybe maybe feel staff feel excluded with many junior staff members of non Christian faith feeling uncomfortable with going so simply didnt. There were a subgroup of staff that organise a large meal with the alcohol flowing but it really is becoming obvious that there needs to be a more inclusive event of the Christmas do is partly to show gratitude to hard working staff.

Do we need to reflect at Christmas not everyone celebrates it and with the continued Christ in the name it is still a relgous festival and as such people with strong faith in other religions may be a little reluctant to embrace the festoval?

We have a state religion and the Head of State is head of the Church of England. Living in a country with a state religion protects all religions. For example, we cant ban the hijab without banning crucifixes and we can't ban crucifixes because Christianity is the state religion, unlike France for example, which has seculariry as part of their constitution. Most people of other faiths are more religious than Brits. I think most of these arguments come from people who want to start trouble in a ' Muslims are taking over' way when most people who follow a religion understand more about religious practices than the largely secular general population. People in your organisation who are mocking people for not turning up to parties need to be called into HR over it. If you want all people to attend a ' thank you ' party have it over the summer'

We're historically a christian country.
I'm atheist.
I have no problem with folk of any religion following their religion, just don't force me to partake.
I don't want to ban any religious clothing/objects, although am happy to speak about how I feel some of it is oppressive. I'm definitely against religious circumcision.

The pp said culturally Christian. Not Christian

This is silly. Things come to a standstill for a month in Qatar due to Ramadan. And that's fine! No-one would expect Ramadan not to happen because it upset the expats.

You do know that Muslims believe in Jesus right? They believe that he was a prophet of God.

I’m not white or Christian (atheist really) this is ridiculous. I love xmas, if I don’t want to go to a party I don’t go (I do drink tbf). I doubt anyone is actually upset about this. Most people I know are quite cheery about other peoples festivals. I wouldn’t think about this that much. People may want to curtail their contribution to a festival they don’t observe to a greeting, a box of chocs or secret Santa anyway.

I have also never heard anyone complain that no-one said happy diwali to them, I wouldn’t indulge this at all. When you find out someone is celebrating a particular religious/cultural event the polite thing to do is say “happy x”. No-one should be expected to walk around with a calendar in their head of events they don’t actually celebrate. I mean what about the pagans the jains, the buddhists, the xy and z’s…. It will never end.

Are there no 'employee resource groups' within the organisation which help to celebrate the holidays of other faiths?

Agree on finding a celebration that doesn't involve alcohol as the centre of it all so anyone can go along and enjoy it - we have a late afternoon Xmas meal with an activity e.g pottery painting etc... (this year we did Xmas bauble decorating) then people who just wanted to eat or have other responsibilities can head home and the ones who want to go out can do so after work but it's not funded by work - it's their own choice to carry on the party.

There's no need to ban or rebrand the Christmas party and I'll willingly fight anyone who says 'happy holidays' to me

Unless you are forcing them to partake in prayers etc I don’t see the big deal.

I work in a company with a lot of Muslims, they come to the Christmas party because it's a good time.

I think you’re conflating different things.

Can we have bank holidays for everything faith’s celebrations? No, that’s impractical.

Should your workplace organise events that are suitable for all its staff? Yes of course.

Christmas parties don’t tend to be religious in tone and IME many employers are moving away from centring events around alcohol (for all sorts of reasons, not just cultural sensitivity).

This is so ridiculously illogical.

First you say it's important to acknowledge diversity and that there are a range of faiths - but for some reason you seem to think that celebrating Christmas somehow goes AGAINST diversity because it's...um...Christian.

Then you say that Christmas is a secular event so should be rebranded to "the holidays".

Then you say that Christmas shouldn't be celebrated at work as it's "pushing a religious celebration" onto people.

I mean, seriously. No one really thinks like this do they? It must be a wind up. If not I despair of your critical thinking skills.

Essentially you're trying to make a big song and dance about being diverse and tolerant while actually showing massive intolerance and not understanding what real diversity is.

Begining of 2030s will be absolute shitshow with Christmas, Hannukah and Eid falling on same few days in one year

This is a Christian country with Christian traditions. I lived in Asia for ten years where we celebrated all sorts of other holy and feast days, but never Christmas or Easter. Did I complain or feel offended? Of course not. I used my leave to celebrate my traditions with people from the same culture and I respected theirs (and joined in when invited) and enjoyed the days off when it was theirs.

When other countries or cultures start cancelling their festivals so as not to offend others then we can start cancelling ours.

But it won’t happen will it.

In a nutshell…

… name a country, faith or culture that would dilute its festivities or celebrations so as not to offend anyone not from that faith or culture.

I’ll wait.

Why?
Presumably most folk don't celebrate them all?

But where is this ‘culturally Christian’ statistic from? What even is culturally Christian? Homophobic, misogynistic… well actually yes, I can see where you are coming from now!!

Nobody is cancelling Christmas, this is getting beyond silly, even for Daily Mail readers.

I also work with many other faiths, including quite a few Muslims. Honestly, this has never been a problem. I think this type of hand wringing always by white British people, actually harms Muslims and others because so many people say "We can't even celebrate Christmas because it offends Muslims." It doesn't.
All our Muslim (and Jewish and Hindu) colleagues come to the Christmas party. Yes, the Muslims don't drink but they still have a great time. Some of the white British people don't drink either. Not everyone wants to drink.
We're a multi-faith team abd we celebrate this. We had a big Eid party tgis year, a big Diwali party and a big Christmas party.

You don't replace christmas, you acknowledge the other religious celebrations in your team. Priority annual leave for those people at for their key celebration dates, celebrate their festivals. Celebrate Eid, Vaisakhi, Diwali. Celebrate the diversity of the team. It'll make for a much more inclusive workplace all round.

As I said, my team isn't hugely diverse but we do have various Europeans - I make sure they get Christmas eve off because that's their big celebration day, and in turn they are very happy to work 25th Dec to allow others to have it off.

This sounds a lot like the beginning of a daily heil article

I meant it in terms of the holidays we traditionally mark.
I'm not christian in terms of faith - I'm an atheist.
Other pp might mean a similar thing?

Of course you can celebrate Christmas. How daft to think otherwise. And it's fine to wish non-Christians Happy Christmas. I say Happy Christmas to my colleagues, and I'm Jewish. I also say Happy Birthday to people when it's their birthday, not mine, and go to their birthday parties to celebrate their special day.

Centring the celebrations on alcohol and noisy partying, though, is a different matter. Changing that focus will be more inclusive of teetotal staff and staff with disabilities, as well as staff of non-Christian faiths.

What would be nice would be to acknowledge other faith festivities. You don't need to go around finding out who is Muslim so you can wish them Eid Mubarak, just put a banner up at the appropriate time, exactly as you would put Christmas decorations up, and be conscious about when you bring in edible treats. And if you do know that they are Muslim, go ahead and acknowledge their special time. Or how about asking them how they would like it acknowledged?

What would be even nicer, would be for people who practice other faiths to be able to take their important feast days off, just as Christians get to have their important feast days off without it coming out of their holiday allocation. Jewish children are allowed, by law, to miss school so they can observe Yom Kippur and other major festivals. Their parents can only do so if they use annual leave or take unpaid leave. I appreciate this may not apply in the NHS, where frontline staff still man Christmas Day and Easter, so have the same conditions as Jewish parents. My dad worked every Christmas Day for several years, as he wasn't bothered about having it off and it was importantly for his colleagues to have it off.

Because there is so much handwringing even when they don't ALL clash😂
Imagine the dillemas management will have then.
I think the made up calendar will have to be redone

Is there actually handwringing or judt perceived handwringing by those looking to be offended by something or other?

We have a winter party, and a summer one. A selection of nice non-alcoholic drinks and all kinds of buffet snacks are provided. If anyone wants alcohol they are welcome to bring a bottle. It seems to work because most people come along.