LET me be the first to say it this year: I hate Xmas. Always have, always will. On the other hand, I love Christmas, and everything about it, apart from when people spell it with an 'X', writes GRAHAM CARTER.

‘Xmas’ gets my goat, despite the fact that I am not a Christian myself, so have no religious axe to grind.I’ve already spotted the first ‘Xmas’ of the year but, thanks to social media there is now something just as annoying: People trying to make excuses for it.

The X stands for ‘chi’ or something, which is Ancient Greek, and because it may have been used as a metaphor for Christ by people who lived thousands of years before we were born or knew how to pick up a pen, apparently that’s OK.

Nonsense. For a start, if you believe that it should be ‘Xmas’, then why don’t you also write ‘Xians’ and ‘Xianity’? I’ll tell you why - because that would be just as silly.

I am absolutely certain that nobody who has ever reduced Christmas to a four-letter word has ever done it because they are a scholar of Ancient Greek, and there can only be one genuine reason why they have done it, and that’s laziness.

I am not saying I am not a lazy person myself sometimes, but I never am when it comes to the English language.

Whether you call it the Queen’s English or revere it as the tongue of Shakespeare, our language helps to define us, so requires respect.

The great irony is that a lot of people who write ‘Xmas’ are also the kind who spout off about our culture being eroded by multi-culturalism.

They will probably also tell you the religion we have been brought up with (even though we may not practise it) is under some kind of threat from others (which it isn’t).

But it is undermining Christianity when the name of the person it is all about gets edited down to a meaningless initial.

What surprises me most about the whole Xmas/Christmas thing is that Christians are usually the first ones to politely tell you that Ancient Greek nonsense, and are surprisingly cool with the idea of their main man being relegated to Mr X.

But put yourself in His place. How would you feel if somebody sent you a birthday card and could only be bothered to write your initial instead of the whole name, and then got that initial wrong?

I am forced to refer back to a memory from several years ago, when I spotted ‘Xmas bazaar’ on a board outside a Swindon church that shall remain nameless.

It was all I could do to stop myself writing a stern letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

I am feeling even more antagonistic towards Xmas this year because since last Christmas English has come under even more pressure, thanks to social media.

In previous years, ‘Xmas’ and the three-letter form of the word ‘barbecue’ (which I cannot even bring myself to type) were the abuses of English that made me choke on my burger and turkey respectively during the course of the year.

Now our lives are awash with people who either don’t know or don’t care whether it’s ‘your’ or ‘you’re’, for example, and are guilty of a thousand other perversions of the language.

So Xmas is now the thin end of a very thick wedge.

There. That’s got that off my chest.

May I be the first to wish you a merry Christmas?