Should We Chinese Celebrate the Western Festivals？.doc

Should We Chinese Celebrate the Western Festivals？ Whether we Chinese should celebrate the western festivals or not has been a subject of heated discussion and argument among people of all ranks recent years. Some say that it’s improper for the western festivals to be celebrated in China because such a festival as Christmas possesses strong religious sense and colors. They are deeply convinced that on the one hand the popularity of the western festivals in China is the result of the foreign cultural invasion and the infiltration1 of the foreign “soft force”. On the other hand, more and more Chinese people, especially young people, have lost their interest in our traditional Chinese festivals like Mid-autumn Festival, Dragon-boat Festival, Tomb-sweeping Day, Double Ninth Festival etc., showing clearly that some countrymen have lost their self-confidence in our national culture and customs. At the advent of the western festivals, such as Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and so forth, a festive air scarcely seen before appears across the country, attracting thousands upon thousands of Chinese people. In general, the Chinese young men almost don’t know the profound implications of our traditional Chinese festivals, instead they are familiar with the western festivals and go after them like a flock of ducks, which has brought about a serious shock to the Chinese traditional culture and the sense of the community. If the situation continues to develop like this, the consequence would be too ghastly to contemplate. They say as most of us don’t believe in Christ, God or religions, and few of us know the meaning of Christmas, what’s the point of celebrating it? Christmas is a festival full of religious colors and meanings for the Christians. If the non-Christians participate in the observance, they are subservient to foreigners.So let’s keep our mind on the traditional Chinese festivals instead. Others think that being one of the achievements won by the Chinese peopl