About 100 years ago if you asked 10 people what Christmas is all about, you'd probably get 10 similar answers - and the church would probably feature somewhere. In 2006 we've become a much more secular society... ask 10 people the same question and you could well get 10 different answers. So what is Christmas, and the season of Advent really all about? Well it's about lots of different things to different people and to reflect this the Anglican Church has created an online Advent calendar. Launched on the 3rd of December (the first day of Advent this year), by the Archbishop of York, behind the window of each day is a different person explaining why Christmas is significant to them. | "No chocolate... although we always have ideas in development, it may be something that we work on" | |
Gillian Oliver is the head of communication development for the Archbishop's Council. She explains why the calendar was put together. "We wanted to open the door on what Christmas really means to people up and down the county. So we spoke to people from Carlisle to Kent and asked them to tell us what Christmas means to them. "We've got people who's story links to the nativity, so we have an expectant mother, an innkeeper and three kings for example. But we've also got a contemporary twist - an estate agent, police inspector and a florist." The idea is that websites like this will help people to understand what the Church is about, especially around the time of major festivals. With four out of 10 people expected to attend a carol service over Advent the Church wants to find better ways of communicating with people who might not come through the door very often, if at all. If you visit the calendar website you'll see a screen with 23 boxes. You can click on any of the doors up until the current date, but you can't go forwards to future dates (a little message appears saying 'no peeking'). Clicking on a door gives you a picture and a short message from that person - their story. Perhaps most importantly, do you get any chocolate? "No chocolate... although we always have ideas in development, it may be something that we work on. "From each story you can click through to find out more about what Christianity is about, what Christmas is about and you can find out where your local church is. "In these stories people are really busy. They're not people who are in church all day long, they're shopping, they're cooking, they're thinking about Christmas and they're preparing. But at some stage between now and Christmas they're going to take some time to stop and reflect. "We find churches are packed at this time of year. People how are really, really busy but want to take some time to just stop and think about what Christmas really means." | 
