After the bustle and frenzy of recent weeks, with social gatherings and parties and preparing for the grand celebrations, Jamaicans will, by and large, sit down tomorrow to reflective dinners, shared with friends and family.

We will, in that respect, not be unlike hundreds of millions of Christians across the globe celebrating the birth, more than 2,000 years ago, of Jesus Christ, whose teachings form the basis of one of the world's great religions. It is a message that is as relevant as it is timeless; of value to the unbeliever, the faithless, the atheist and the agnostic as it is to Christians.

For stripped of all its rituals and burden, it is a simple declaration of hope and a call to equity, so eloquently summarised by that early visitor, who understood Christ's special place in the world: peace on earth and goodwill to all men.

Perhaps in contemplating this statement and the broader teachings of Jesus Christ, Jamaicans may be wont to reflect on the happenings in countries gripped by wars and civil conflict. Our thoughts, perhaps, may turn to Iraq, Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories and other seeming faraway places we see on the news, with the images of hunger and suffering.

It is important that we reflect on these places and hope with and for them, that they too may enjoy relative peace and prosperity and goodwill. But even as we carry Christ's message of hope to others, we would be wrong to assume that it is not needed in heavy doses in Jamaica.

In many respects, our country is one of relatively good fortune. We have, in most respects, a functioning democracy and are in a position to exercise free will. And compared to many other countries, Jamaicans, or a substantial portion of us, enjoy a decent quality of life.

Yet, too many of our citizens remain on the margins, outside the embrace of the goodwill and peace on earth that is God's grace and in furtherance of whose fulfilment he placed his Son on earth, giving cause for the Christmas celebration. Indeed, many Jamaicans, mostly in our inner-city communities, live in fear of criminal violence, evidenced by the more than 1,200 murders so far this year. Many Jamaicans, too, live in dire poverty and privation and in an absence of hope.

Christmas and the celebration of the birth of Jesus is in a sense, therefore, a call to arms and a demand that we work for transformation, so that a lack of hope does not calcify into resignation and despair. For the essential message of Jesus Christ, underpinned by this call to peace on earth and goodwill to all men, is that the diminution of one is the pulling down of the many. All are whole in one. Cherry Gardens, in that context, is not safe in the absence of peace in Arnett Gardens.

So, as we celebrate with friends and relatives this Christmas, it is important that we do not lose sight of all about us and of God's command as manifested in Jesus Christ.

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