I don’t believe I’m being overly dramatic when I tell you that around this time last year, I suffered an existential crisis. I was hosting two other families for Christmas lunch – dear friends who I’ve broken bread with many times – but this time it was to be my house, at my table, on a day that means different things for them than me. They are church-attending Christians and I’m an atheist.

Delivering a religious grace before our meal could be seen as insincere. Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto

How was I to honour my friends and their beliefs while feeling like a fraud for my own endearment to Christmas – a day that celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ, the son of God? I’ve sung along to Christmas carols, sent cards with nativity scenes and still buy advent calendars for my adult children, but a belief in an almighty eludes me.

Concern as to my hypocrisy at celebrating Christmas was one thing, but doubling down by delivering a religious grace before our meal was hitting red on the insincerity scale. I needed to explore what Christmas means for atheists like me and deliver a welcome that defined where our beliefs intersected.

Fortunately for me, some years back I had read

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