Identify the central theme of the passage.

Concept

A central theme is the broad controlling idea that unifies the whole passage, not merely one example or detail.

It should account for the writer's main contrast, development, and concluding message without making the claim narrower or more extreme than the text.

Application

The passage moves from festivals as expressions of gratitude and community to the environmental damage caused by modern excess. Its concluding sentence then joins these strands by arguing that celebration can endure only when it is balanced with ecological responsibility.

Contrast

• “Festivals are mainly occasions for waste and environmental pollution” focuses on one modern problem and ignores the passage's positive cultural and ecological purpose.

• “Festivals must balance joy with ecological responsibility to retain their essence” includes both the value of celebration and the need for sustainability that the conclusion emphasizes.

• “Festivals serve as spectacles of human excess without cultural meaning” overstates the criticism because the passage explicitly preserves connection, memory, gratitude, and cultural meaning.

• “Festivals are no longer relevant in the modern age of technology” introduces technological irrelevance, an idea the passage does not argue.

Cross-check

The selected theme explains both halves of the passage: why traditional festivals matter and why present-day practices need reform. The other statements explain only a fragment or add an unsupported extreme.

Result

Therefore, the central theme is that festivals must balance joy with ecological responsibility to retain their essence.