There are those who argue that the public celebration of festivals such as Christmas should be discouraged, in the questionable belief that it might somehow offend those of other religions or none.

My son is a tree surgeon and gets me a lovely tree. I like to put it up early, as I can't wait for Christmas. We dress it with decorations that have been in the family for years.

Britain's passion for Christmas and huge white weddings dates from Victorian times - both were low-key celebrations before Victoria and her PR machine.

For the millions of Americans, like my family, who believe that there is a creator God who can be known personally, Christmas is a celebration of Jesus' offer of love and forgiveness for all people.

Dickens was a part of how the whole celebration of Christmas as we know it today emerged during the 19th century.

A Christian's celebration of Christmas should be a lot different from that of nonbelievers.

For many of us, Christmas lunch is the most special meal of the year - and I certainly want nothing but the very best for this celebration.

Brits and Americans have hundreds of different phrases for the same thing. Luckily, it's usually a source of amusement rather than frustration. A flashlight by any other name is still a torch. My personal favourite is 'fairy lights,' which we boringly refer to as 'Christmas lights.'

I love the excess of Christmas. The shopping season that begins in September, the bad pop star recordings of Christmas carols, the decorations that don't know when to come down.

I suppose if you look back to your early childhood you accept everything people tell you, and that includes a heavy dose of irrationality - you're told about tooth fairies and Father Christmas and things.

I loved raising my kids. I loved the process, the dirt of it, the tears of it, the frustration of it, Christmas, Easter, birthdays, growth charts, pediatrician appointments. I loved all of it.

I get very unsettled by the mess of Christmas. I find the decorations a little bit hard, as my desire for everything to match is never fully satisfied.

I think Christmas is about celebration and come on, on the inside everyone wants to dance.

Christmas in Bethlehem. The ancient dream: a cold, clear night made brilliant by a glorious star, the smell of incense, shepherds and wise men falling to their knees in adoration of the sweet baby, the incarnation of perfect love.

Anybody who doesn't see the impact of climate change is really, I would say, myopic. They don't see the reality. It's so evident that we are destroying Mother Earth. This is not the problem of one country or a few countries: it is the problem of mankind. We need to work together to stop this. Otherwise, our future generations will simply disappear.

Let me be absolutely clear. Israel is a strong friend of Israel's. It will be a strong friend of Israel's under a McCain administration. It will be a strong friend of Israel's under an Obama administration. So that policy is not going to change.

The thing that alarms me is that there are so many clergymen who say that the so-called 'new morality' is all right. They say we're living in a new generation; let's be relevant, let's change God's law. Let's say that adultery is all right under certain circumstances; fornication's all right under certain circumstances. If it's 'meaningful.'

The why is what makes journalism an adult game. The why is what makes policy coherent and useful. The why is what transforms bureaucrats and foot soldiers and political leaders into viable instruments of rational and affirmative change. The why is everything and without it, the very suggestion of human progress becomes a cosmic joke.

Effectively, change is almost impossible without industry-wide collaboration, cooperation and consensus.

Climate change is not just about carbon dioxide levels and melting polar ice caps. It is about our public health and protecting our Earth for future generations.

We are all living together on a single planet, which is threatened by our own actions. And if you don't have some kind of global cooperation, nationalism is just not on the right level to tackle the problems, whether it's climate change or whether it's technological disruption.

The burdens of generations of poverty and powerlessness lie heavy in the fields of America. If we fail, there are those who will see violence as the shortcut to change.

The specter of climate change threatens worsening natural disasters, rapid urbanization, forced migration, and economic hardship for the most vulnerable. Despite significant global advances, inability to effectively address epidemics and health emergencies still prevail and continuously threaten global health security and economic development.

Change will come slowly, across generations, because old beliefs die hard even when demonstrably false.