EPICURIOUS: THE CARDINAL’S FEAST |
I often tease Cardinal Joseph Coutts, the second priest in Pakistan to rise to the esteemed position of cardinal, about his uncanny resemblance to Santa Claus.
I also bring up the globally popular Christmas tradition where children keep aside milk and cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve to keep his energy up while distributing gifts all night and ask him what he prefers to have on Christmas eve or Christmas day. The question amuses and surprises him in equal measure.
“My entire focus on Christmas is on prayer, from the midnight mass to the day’s services,” he reminds me. “Christmas feasts, cookies and cakes and celebration are for you all. I don’t have time to think about such things,” he says.
This is followed by a short lecture on how people here are becoming too ‘Westernised’ with time. “The English have Christmas parties with food and drink, cakes, cheese and pies. There is also a tradition of having roast turkey in the West for Christmas dinner,” Cardinal Coutts continues, adding that it is for those who can afford it. “Christmas is........