Who here celebrates christmas?

[Shlup]

i thought i read somewhere that you were an athiest ?

You must have been upsidedown.

[Polaris]

It's not celebrating Christmas but it's a time where my familie gets an excuse to get all together without fights! ^^ It's good to think that!!!!

[Wind Shear]

I don't celebrate Christmas, I do commemorate.

It's really bad that I cannot go home (Iligan City) during Christmas because my boss ordered me to stay here (Lapu-Lapu City) to do some work even they declared no-work on the 4th week of December. At first it sucks, but hey, I see more money on the next payroll!

[Itsunari 2000]

I don't " celebrate " as such, but I merely " observe."

[Little Miss Awesome]

I do, and I love it, I'm like a little kid when it comes to Christmas

[Zante]

celebrate Christmas in a non-religious way. I love buying presents and everything else that goes along with the materialistic and decorative end of it, as well as just the whole 'spirit' thing...in a non-religious 'spirit' way.

Same here.

I don't. Personally, finding out about the true origins of Christmas made it more than enough for me to stay away from. For anyone who's curious, you could say I'm a Christian.

It really doesn't surprise me that non-beleivers celebrate it because it was never a Christian thing to begin with.

You made me currious. By true origin of christmass, do you mean that sun worshiping business?

[Jess]

I celebrate Christmas in a non-religious way. I love buying presents and everything else that goes along with the materialistic and decorative end of it, as well as just the whole 'spirit' thing...in a non-religious 'spirit' way.

Same here. ^_^

[KentaRawr!]

Of course I do! It's fun to celebrate consumerism! n.n

Plus it's fun to get gifts for other people. The feel of "Oh! He/she will love that!" is really great.

The religious side of it really has faded away. Only Charlie Brown knows what X-Mas is about now.

[Meat Puppet]

I don't celebrate christmas at all anymore, but I will kindly accept gifts, lunches and dinners.

[Zeldy]

I celebrate Christmas. But not because of Jesus. Its the day he was born wasn't it? Im a prodestant meh. I can't even remember what that means ^_~;

[Dreddz]

My family treat Christmas as a family occasion, with presents given, a family Christmas lunch. And good tele. We dont celebrate for the religous part, as our family is not religous in any way. We arent that traditional either, we decided not to get a Christmas tree ( second year running )
And are having Duck instead of turkey for lunch........

[Truth]

To answer the two people who asked questions, No, Christmas is not the day of Jesus's birth. If you look at the biblical account and udnerstand Jewish culture and seasons, it's more likely that Jesus was born in the late spring or early fall. He may have even been born on a special Jewish festival.

In regards to the person who asked about Christmas's origins, I'm referring to Everything about it. Everything aside of the biblical story of Jesus is entirely paganistic, and they even don't tell the biblical story right on the day.

Christmas (Christ's Mass) was insitituted by Catholocism's pope in order to merge paganism and Christianity and attempt to consolodate power. Some have said that the holiday was created merely Near the pagan dates to attempt to bring the pagans to a cross over, but it's more likely that the pagans who seemed itnerested in Christianity, but wanted to keep their general culture were "bargained for" by the pope.

Everything you can imagine from the customs (Mistletoe from the orgy of Saturnalia, Santa Claus from the old man's sidekick, Odin, and possibly Marduk, among others, the druidic rituals surrounding the Yule, the pagan worship of their nature god with the evergreen tree and decorations of gold and silver as mentioned in Jerimiah chapter 10, and the more blasphemous aspects like putting Jesus up as Invictus Sol, the unconquerable sun god that was the pagan twist on Elohiym (Yahweh) with the sun's birth on December 25th. (Tammuz from Sumeria, the same Tammuz who would have been Nimrod's son.) The day is overflowing with paganism, which is why I completely understand why wiccans and pagans love the holiday once they simply "blow off" Christ and perhaps even make allusion to their own myths regarding Him.

It's really no light matter to me, especially since it's directly insulting to Jesus.

I have a story that might help to make my point. Keep in mind that human sacrifice was common in some of the pagan cultures that Christmas is adopted from, and, yes, they would have done it on the solstices.

http://www.biblestudy.org/basicart/xmasmem.html

You should read the whole thing, but here's an excerpt.

The year is 1937 in Nazi Germany, and the churches are in trouble. The Lutheran Church is losing young members of the Luther League who want to join the more flamboyant Hitler Youth. The Adventists are failing in business because they are seen to outwardly resemble the Jews in their Sabbath observance. Not all the churches are faltering, however, since some church leaders are advocating a few changes.

Some of the ministers reason that, to win the young people back to Christ, the church needs to make a few minor modifications. For example, Hitler's birthday falls on April 20, and there are celebrations throughout Germany on that day. Since nobody knows when Jesus was born, they select April 20 as the day to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Also, by adding a few short nooks to the cross, it can now look strikingly like a swastika, only they will call it the cross of Christ.

The number of members coming back to church increases greatly with each change they make. Their families now march around the cross of Christ with their right arms fully extended to glorify the Lord. Sure, they look a lot like any other Nazi family down the street, but the church was now growing again. Celebrating the resurrection of the Lord will also happen to fall on the anniversary of the rise of the Third Reich. Needless to say, the churches which adapted to the new Germany thrive, while those that refuse to compromise are severely persecuted and scattered.

After the war, all of the customs and trappings of those days continue. Hundreds of years later people still celebrate the birth of Jesus on April 20. They set up the cross of Christ in their living room while the families extend their right hands to salute it.

It is a wonderful time. The children make little cookie people, the one's with the six-pointed star of Bethlehem on their chests, and bake them in their ovens. There is some mythology about the man with a funny mustache who knows if you've been naughty or nice, but mainly it is a religious holiday. Sometimes a lot of families get together and build a big bonfire. An honored family member carries the cross of Christ with all of its banners attached to the pole. Everyone marches around the bonfire to the tune of "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken" while their right arms are fully extended to salute the cross and praise the Lord Jesus.

One day a man comes to church and tries to tell them about the origin of their holidays. They don't seem shocked at all. To them terms like Nazi, holocaust and Hitler are meaningless. It doesn't matter what happened centuries before anyway, because they are worshiping the Lord. Their memories of past April 20s are filled with love and joy. Songs of gladness are sung as they bake the little cookie people in the ovens. Life is good, and God must be pleased.

Then the man posed a question to them: What are God's holiday memories?

Closer To Home

Would any Christian today doubt the need to tell the characters in the preceding story about the origins of their Christmas? How would God feel about choosing of all days the birth of Adolph Hitler to represent the birth of His son? How would God feel about the day symbolizing the resurrection of the Third Reich to represent Jesus' resurrection?

How about the cross that he bled on symbolized in a swastika or people giving it the Nazi salute? What about the little cookie people with the six-pointed star of Bethlehem on their chests that were baked in the ovens? Wouldn't people want to know how that custom got started?

Surprisingly, those in this story would probably give the same responses as to why it is okay to celebrate their April 20 Christmas as those do today who want to keep their December 25 Christmas: "We've always had Christmas on that date, and, besides, it doesn't really matter what day you choose." "It's good for the children." "We try to keep the commercialism down and emphasize the birth of Jesus." "God understands our hearts, and we get so much out of these days." "We just put a little cross of Christ in our home, nothing fancy or elaborate." "Mom would really be disappointed if we didn't appreciate all the work she put into this day."


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In case you're wodnering, the cross was actually a pagan symbol of the sun god, which leads em to think ti's reasonable to say that's why it was one of their death devices. When people hold up a cross or use Catholic/Lutheran symbolism, they probably have little or no idea that they're using a worship symbol to a false god. The (reverse) swastika was possibly used to symbolize that, I think.

For those who aren't Christian, this won't matter anyway, but I'm putting it out there as part of my own reasons.

As well, I think it's ebtter to give gifts when people don't expect them, and thus appreciate them more. Christmas is a time when people think about themselves more than others, and that's useless.

[Zante]

Interesting stuff. I can see why you wouldn't want to celebrate christmas, if you look at it like that.

[ffxfreak93]

yeah i celebrate christmas

[Roto13]

I'm not going to read that.

But yeah, I'm all about Christmas. I love it, and I always have. Hell, I spent my weekend Christmasifiying other people's avatars on two different web sites.

I mean, look at them all.