Christmas on Gallifrey is the first Marion and Kristoph Christmas story. By the time it came to writing this story I had five ongoing story arcs and did Christmas stories for each of them. This one was at least easy going. There isn’t any kind of action in it. It really is just people having a good time at Christmas.

Bringing Christmas to Gallifrey is a bit of a tall order, of course. Some people might be a bit purist and dislike the idea. But if The Doctor really is half Human on his mother’s side, he ought to know about Christmas. Well, assuming that his mother is western and of a Christian background. I am aware that Christianity is only one Earth religion. If Marion had been Jewish it might have been a different story altogether!

But she is from Liverpool, or more precisely, from Birkenhead. And that proved to be an interesting coincidence at Christmas 2007 when this story was posted. As part of the Liverpool 08 celebrations, there was a live show in the streets of Liverpool on December 18^th, 2007, telling the nativity story as a huge street theatre production. On that evening I had emails and phone calls from several Marion and Kristoph fans who were so excited to realise that the Liverpool Nativity Mary came from Birkenhead, too. They were drawing some very interesting conclusions, but it WAS all a coincidence.

Marion explaining the Nativity to her friends on Gallifrey, though, raises, I think, some interesting ideas. Explaining a king born in a stable to people who have never heard the story before is a tricky thing.

I may, actually, have upset a few devout Christians with the next part of the story, by the way.

“Here, on Gallifrey we have a legend that a child will be born who will bear the Mark of Rassilon and he will be the greatest Time Lord of all.

“Greater than Rassilon?” Marion asked.

“Indeed,” Aineytta continued. “Once in a dozen generations one is born with the Mark of Rassilon, and he is a great leader or a great philosopher. But there is the belief that one day the greatest of all will be born. One who will be more than just another Time Lord. One who will stand tall amongst our own people, and the people of the universe. One who will be as great as our Creator, who will fulfil a great destiny.”

To be clear on this, I am not suggesting that Chrístõ or The Doctor as he will be by the time he fulfils his destiny, is in any way similar to Jesus Christ. The Doctor is not the son of any god. He is a mortal man and always meant to be. He is a singular man, that is all.

The dinner party that included the servants of the two houses as well as aristocrats, is something of a biblical idea. Many of the dinners Jesus attends in the gospels are ones in which servants and masters eat together. And there is a passage in Luke that is close to what I was thinking of. 

“Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid.  But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

But I’m still not making any direct comparisons, only showing how a bit of egalitarianism might be introduced into Gallifreyan society.

The turkey with no bones was a little idea I had as I wrote the story. Having described Cúl nut processed food many times in the different story arcs, it seemed right to have the turkeys made from it. And the lack of bone was the give away.

The thing with the language on the gift boxes was a result of thinking about the whole babel fish technology of the TARDIS and how Marion would be understood and make herself understood on Gallifrey. Assuming she speaks English, everyone she knows speaks Gallifreyan. She understands them and they understand her because she has travelled by TARDIS and has the ‘gift’ from it. But her servants have not travelled by TARDIS and would not know written English. Makes sense, doesn’t it? I think it does.

And the elder Lord de Lœngbǽrrow sums it all up in the end.

“Your Earth custom has much to commend it,” agreed his father, Lord de Lœngbǽrrow as he admired the shine on the brass model of a telescope with his name inscribed in English on the wooden plinth. “We should have Christmas again on Gallifrey.

“Only once a year,” Marion insisted. “Even on Gallifrey Christmas should only be once a year.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vycpF1B1Tss