Oh the zealous defence of the secularised Christmas! Out with the Christian "myths". No carols, please; we're multicultural. It's easy to tell Christians to stop singing. But the follow-through would require the wholesale re-education and demythologising of the populace. Try persuading a group of playgroup mums that whilst Santa could probably get away with "Ho! Ho! Ho!", he'd best find another word to put after "Merry". Mind you that would be a cinch compared with banning Santa completely - a move surely essential to a serious purge. Santa's true antecessor St Nicholas was a Christian bishop who probably even believed in virgin births. Massive resistance is assured to any politically neutral rebadging of "......mas". Mainstream Australian families may be too consumed with credit card debts and stuffed turkeys to notice Jesus, whom Christians believe to be a desperate world’s only hope. But they will not readily cast off cultural traditions which derive from the bedrock influence of the Bible and the Christian gospel on our society’s foundations. Keith S. Cornish (22/12) calls on Christians to acknowledge that "thoughtful people" (which presumably excludes theists of all shades) no longer believe in "myths". But it's not only Christians he has to contend with.