KEY POINTS:
It's Christmas time and what every little boy and girl would like most of all is to be famous.
"Being a celebrity" has topped a list of what children under 10 believe to be the "very best thing in the world" in a UK survey carried out for National Kids' Day.
Those who believe we live in an increasingly shallow culture fuelled by reality television will not be surprised to learn that numbers two and three in the poll of 2500 children were "good looks" and "being rich".
But all is not lost. Children, perhaps taking a cue from their celebrity idols, are not ignorant of the problems in the world.
They put "killing" and "wars" at the head of a list of the "very worst things in the world" followed by drunks, bullies, illness, smoking, stealing, divorce and being fat.
Dying is in tenth place. The research was carried out through schools and for National Kids' Day which was at the weekend.
The children put God in tenth place of the best things in the world, the supreme being losing out to families, friends, pop music and watching films. He did, however, come first in the list of the most famous people, beating US President George W. Bush and Madonna into second and third place. Father Christmas is number five, with Jesus at number four.
Children may have relegated God for worldly pleasures but their parents haven't. Eight out of ten Britons believe that celebrating the birth of Christ is an integral part of Christmas, according to another poll.
And 90 per cent of those polled complained that Christmas has been too commercialised.
The findings come amid a welter of press stories, many of them urban myths, about councils or other employers wanting to ban the use of the word Christmas in case it offends non-Christians. Years ago, in the Independent, the Archbishop of York, John Sentanu, warned against "aggressive" secularism that would "erase" Christianity from public life.
Despite all the advertising that bombards people with suggestions for presents they might like to give or receive on Christmas Day, the poll carried out for the theology think-tank Theos suggests that unwrapping those parcels is one of the least of the season's perks.
They agree with children in putting family and friends high on the list.
Asked by the pollsters to specify what was the best aspect of the seasonal break, 86 per cent said that it was "spending time with family and friends". This compared with 7 per cent who said "time off work", 3 per cent who said "food and drink" and only 2 per cent who said "presents".
Asked to name the worst things about Christmas, 43 per cent said "financial pressures", compared with 26 per cent who said the "absence of loved ones", 18 per cent who said "eating and drinking too much" and 7 per cent who said "family arguments".
Nearly two thirds - 62 per cent - said that Christmas made them think about spiritual things, and 77 per cent said that Christmas made them think about what was important to them.
The findings support early evidence that church attendance has gone up sharply this Christmas, with some big churches having to arrange extra carol services. Answering questions from Independent readers, the Archbishop of York denied that Britain has become a "godless" country.
He wrote: "Every week you will find more people worshipping at churches than at all football grounds, premiership, league and non-league combined."
Asked what rules they would make if they were king or queen of the world, the number one response from the under-10s was to ban knives and guns.
They would also put a stop to fighting and killing, telling lies, drugs, bullying, drunks, and smoking.
The children who answered the survey would also put a stop to stealing, but wanted more holidays and more hospitals.
Patricia Murchie of Luton First, who organised the survey, said: "The idea of the special Kids' Day is to give pre-teens a national voice for their opinions in a very simple format.
"This particular age group has some very clear ideas on how the world could be changed for the better."
- INDEPENDENT
