I find that interesting as well, but I suppose we all like holidays from the perspective of not having to work.

I appreciate everyone's comments and the kind, civil way they were offered.

 

Halloween!!!

 

Easter is the more important Christian feast as it celebrates the resurection event which is cements salvation. It was always a major feast in the Church calendar. Without Easter, there is no point to the rest of the New Tesament, i.e., no salvation. It remained also closely tied to its historical depicted date.

Christmas, on the other hand, was so minor a holiday in the early Church it was moved from when it historically would have happened to coincide with the winter solstice celebrations. Until Christmas became commercialized and popularized by the likes of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol and Thomas Nast's imagery, it was hardly noticeable and in some cases, as in Puritan New England, its celebration was banned.

 

That's really interesting. Was it banned because of the feared link to other celebrations of the winter soltice or just why? Seems the birth of the Christian Saviour would have warranted a celebration, especially after the decision that he was in fact the Saviour. I understand that without the Resurrection the remainder of the Christian religious beliefs would be moot, but I'm surprised to hear that the celebration of the birth was so insignificant or even banned.

I appreciate everyone's comments. I'm learning a lot.

 

Puritans and Christmas

 

Wasn't Chrismas moved to its current date because it would coincide with an existing pagan "holiday?" When the goal was to convert the pagans, that would make some sense, right? The Orthodox and Coptic Christians celebrate the supposed original date in January, right?

 

Most of the pagan Holidays were preempted with Christian holidays. If there wasn't a legitimate Christian one then one was invented.

For instance, Christmas shouldn't come when it does.

 

Part of why Christmas was moved was the early persecution of Christians. It wouldn't be the wisest of moves to celebrate a feast in , say March letting the pwers that were know you were of a banned faith. Much easier to go along stealthily with an existing feast. Ecventually, the trappings of the older feast got incorporated into the newer one.

Given the prevalence of lambs in the stories, and, IIRC, the historic date of the census sending people back to their home towns to be couinted, Christmas should have been celebrated sometime in late marchor early April. This would also have created a celebratory conflict with Easter.

Using this as a model, I present a modest proposal: religious Christmas is moved to an early spring date. No trapings, no big secular doings, no gifting, etc. It remains a strictly religious event, like Good Friday or Yom Kippur or Ramadan.

Secular X-Mas remains where it is and all the non-religious festivities continue, shoppping, winter songs, selling, yule trees, buying gifts, etc. Business gets it frenzy of business and the religious folks get to celebrate the birth of Christ in relative peace and tranquility.

 

You are correct. December 25 was chosen by Pope Julius I in 354 CE. It is generally accepted that Pope Julius chose the date because it coincided with several holidays -- Saturnalia, the birthday of Mithra, and Juvenalia. The intent was to promote the conversion of "pagan" Romans to Christianity.
The Celtic culture also had a winter solstice holiday - Yule - which took place around the same time.
As Christianity spread into northern Europe, the Christians exploited this holiday as well in their various campaigns to subjugate and eradicate that culture.

 

If few customers are going to show up, and all of your employees will be asking for the day off, then you might as well close.

Personally, I don't care if it's Christmas or National Tennis Ball Awareness Day -- a day off is always welcome!