The man who invented Christmas – Walking With Giants

It was the 31-year-old Charles Dickens, of course, who invented the modern Christmas. Giving himself just six weeks to come up with Christmas ghost story that would be released in time for the holiday, he came up with A Christmas Carol.

Starring Dan Stevens as Dickens himself, and Christopher Plummer as Scrooge, The Man Who Invented Christmas tells the story of the writing of A Christmas Carol, with characters from the story interacting with the author himself and so revealing insights into both the writer’s life and his story. In the film, both Scrooge and Dickens himself find redemption: ‘in both cases, a man reviewing his past is inspired to demonstrate radical generosity to someone he’d previously found difficult to love.’

So this, in a nutshell, is the modern, secular, sentimental ‘spirit of Christmas’: ‘a time to reflect, embrace our better selves, and celebrate our family and friends.’

In a Dickens Christmas, one’s heartfelt resolution to be a better person transforms a bleak future into joyful one. The holiday is for making peace with our fellow man, for changing our ways, and for celebrating these hopeful events with gifts and lit trees and laughter-filled parties.

No-one (I hope) is going to argue against unselfishness and forgiveness. But, in both book and film these virtues are allowed to displace the central truth that Christ came in the flesh. They become distractions from

the ultimate story of a being who comes from outside time and enters into history to point the way toward redemption. It is his generosity, not ours, that transforms hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. Without Christ, no amount of personal reflection or resolution-making can redeem a lost soul.

A Dickensian Christmas can indeed warm our hearts. But only a Christian Christmas can change our hearts.

Quoting this review by Laura Kenny in Christianity Today.