Mrs C & I went to Church this afternoon. The last time we went was almost twelve months ago, a visit equally immortalised in one of these 'ere columns, although this afternoon's visit was not a repeat of the Christmas Tableaux; no, that dubious and unrehearsed pleasure still awaits us in a couple of weeks' time. However, the cause of our uncharacteristic attendance at Church today was the same - namely Little Miss had volunteered to take part, on this occasion as one of the prayer-readers at the Christingle Service.

Having been brought up in a Methodist family, if there are any religious associations for me at this time of year, it is with the format and traditions of Methodism (which, for the sake of convenience, and without wishing to be anything less than thoroughly objective, I will refer to hereafter as 'the right way'). All I knew of the Christingle service prior to this afternoon, since it is not a tradition at all followed in Methodism (unless it's been embraced in the past few years without my realising, in much the same way that the Labour Party appears to have become Thatcherites over the past decade) was that it involved an orange with cocktail sticks stuck into it. To be fair, I now realise that there is at least a nominal reason for this, with the orange representing the world, and the cocktail sticks, of which there are four, being variously the four seasons or the four points of the compass. The cocktail sticks, incidentally, come with various things on them - perhaps with a half-memory of children's birthday parties, I rather expected it to be cheese and pineapple, but the contents this afternoon were a heady combination of marshmallows, apricots, and (my own personal favourite) liquorice allsorts.

Before anybody gets bogged down in spurious theology, debating the spiritual significance of the liquorice allsort (which, if anything, I would suspect is far too pleasurable to be anything other than the sinful work of "the other fellow") let me clarify that the sweets and fruit are merely to illustrate the general sense of "the fruits of nature" and thus are generically, rather than individually, significant.

But, I did find myself wondering this afternoon, and perhaps it simply follows on from my previous witterings about not feeling Christmassy yet, whether this Christingle service was an intrinsically Christmas event. Or rather, I recalled December services at Chapel from earlier times, which always felt unquestionably Christmassy, and I found myself wondering why this Church Christingle service didn't. I suspect it's to do with my starting to question basic assumptions, a trait which I don't think can ever be dismissed as a bad thing (although it can be an annoying thing, apparently, when I'm trying to philosophise while something's on the telly). The songs (I probably ought to say hymns, but I do hesitate to say so, since I didn't recognise more than one of them) we sang this afternoon didn't make any mention of Christmas at all that I could see - and so coming to it as very much an outsider, they made no dent on my lack of Yuletide spirit at all.

I had of course thought that maybe a burst of "Hark the Herald" or a first Noel or two would get me on track, but since we didn't have them, I can't vouch for whether they would have or not. But although those carols do at least refer to Christmas, are they really any more intrinsically Christmassy than, say, "Jesus bids us shine with a pure clear light" which we did sing (well, I sang anyway - the reasons for my wife's not doing so were relayed at some length this time last year)? Isn't the truth, in fact, that I feel that singing "Oh Come All Ye Faithful!" would seem Christmassy, simply because for at least the first twenty years of my life, we always did sing it at Christmas? In other words, it is appropriate only by association.

Put another way, I could see that there were certainly some people there this afternoon who were loving it, enjoying the traditional Christingle service that they always have at this time of year and no doubt (if I can splash out on a third set of italics) feeling Christmassy because of it. To my subconsciously-Methodist point of view, it seemed to lack any real sense of occasion or season, but I have to objectively (albeit begrudgingly) concede that it probably is just a matter of perspective. The difference between a window-display of Christingles, and a bacofoil covered tray of oranges impaled with candles, is simply in how you look at it.

What's interesting, even enlightening, about this is that I feel a sense of having come through the Looking Glass, of seeing things now from a different point of view. Last year when I wrote about Mrs C and her mother not singing carols, because they didn't have any particular history of doing that at Christmas, it was with a sense (even if I didn't say it) that there was something aberrant about that, as if there was automatically something excitingly seasonal about singing them; but this year I suppose I can see that it's all down to how you look at it, and where you look at it from, and really just to what you are used to. For Mrs C, Christmas is not in any sense defined by the tunes of "In the Bleak Midwinter" or "Silent Night" - and it isn't defined for either of us by holding an orange with candles and cocktail sticks hanging out of it. Rather ironically, that state of affairs can be summed up by a quote from one Mr Scrooge, who famously asked to be allowed to keep Christmas in his own way!

Meanwhile, in other news...

Our lack of Christmas present-buying continues unabated, by which I mean of course that we still haven't bought anything. I have started on a list of ideas, and I did ask my father-in-law this afternoon what he'd like for Christmas (his answer was to look with despair around his hopelessly-cluttered front room and suggest we just put some money in the charity box on his behalf) but it hasn't got any further than that. Theoretically, I ought to have spent the past month (at least!) panicking on how we were going to afford Christmas, but although paying the milk bill and keeping up with the Council Tax sometimes occupy my thoughts from the minute I awake, I honestly haven't given Christmas a moment's thought - and yet earlier this week, out of the blue (or should that be out of the red?) I got a refund from the Inland Revenue which if not perhaps covering the entire thing will certainly go some way toward the cost of it.

Which I suppose brings me to Little Miss Curnow, who despite her intermittent gaffe of forcing us to go to Church is still likely to be the main beneficiary of the taxman's founding of the feast. Not out of any real sense of trying to deprive her, more out of a generally naughty side to my nature where she's concerned, I have been referring to her as a Buddhist for the past few weeks. To a Doctor Who fan, Buddhist means "Planet of the Spiders", "Kinda" and Barry Letts; but to my daughter, who remains as yet unconvinced of the wonders of Doctor Who (well she's only young, she doesn't know any better) the single point of reference is the episode of "The Simpsons" where Lisa becomes a Buddhist.

The conversations we've had on the subject have generally taken this form:

Little Miss (seeing a toy ad on TV, and being easy prey to the insidious powers of advertising): I'd like that!

Nasty Dad (that's me): Mm, but of course being a Buddhist you rise above the acquisition of material possessions.

Little Miss: I'm not a Buddhist!!!!

Of course, I know that even if I were seriously trying to avoid buying her presents on religious grounds (which I'm not - honest!) I'm on shaky ground. Little Miss, who claims not to be able to remember the difference in spelling between 'lick' and 'like' or what 9 x 7 is, can nevertheless remember the plots of, and even quotes from, dozens of episodes of "The Simpsons" - and so she well knows that the end of the "Lisa the Buddhist" episode has Richard Gere (or at least, his yellow-skinned, four-fingered alter ego) explain to Lisa that Buddhists can still celebrate Christmas and, most dear to Lisa's (and indeed Miss Curnow's) heart, can still receive presents.

Curiously enough, one thing I've noticed during these little father/daughter exchanges (and yes, although it does annoy her, and although it is an empty 'threat' anyway, I have gone through the "You're a Buddhist" routine many times in the past few weeks - to quote Seymour Skinner, which being as he's a character in "The Simpsons" my daughter probably could, in many ways I'm a petty man) is that she hasn't tried to counter with the assertion that me and her mother aren't the main source of presents. In other words, she hasn't referred to Santa Claus at all this year...

...except once. Last year, or it may even have been the year before, mother-in-law produced a "Thankyou for the mince pie and the carrot for the reindeer" card to Little Miss, from Father Christmas, to be discovered on Christmas day. A couple of weeks ago, Miss C showed me it, and said inquiringly, "That's not your handwriting, is it?" I of course answered truthfully that it wasn't, but it was clear that she was starting to think things through. It could be that although she doesn't know what 9 x 7 is, she might be able to put 2 and 2 together. We shall see...