Question by Fitz: Why do Christians celebrate a pagan festival?
The pagan festival in question being what they call Christmas, also known as Yule.
Christmas is a pagan festival adopted by the Roman Catholic Church (just like Easter from the Anglo-Saxon fertility goddess Eostre, & Hallowe’en which was originally a Gaelic, Anglo-Saxon & Scandinavian celebration of dead ancestors). Pope Julius I declared that Christ’s birth would be celebrated on December 25 in 350 AD in an attempt to make Christianity more acceptable to pagans.
The common Western concept of Christmas, even including national variances, is essentially a fusion of Roman, Indo-European, Nordic and Celtic Pagan festivals and symbolism. Not all of these festivals were strictly religious.
Jeremiah 10:2-4 calls Yule trees ‘heathen’ & condemns them; Kissing under mistletoe is a pagan fertility rite (the white berries represent the sperm of Woden); Gift giving is a pagan tradition from the Roman Mithras festival which ultimately originated in Sumeria; the Yule log is a pagan Scandinavian tradition marking the lengthening of days.
Please explain why Christians celebrate this Pagan festival & these pagan rites?
Best answer:
Answer by don45123
hey…they took santa clause from them
Add your own answer in the comments!
To be more compatible with all the Pagans.
something about pagans being around first and christians wanted it to be a bit more civilized so they put clothes on and sat round a table for christmas dinner……. i think
Because christianity is a young religion, it rips of pagan gods and takes many things off the pagans. This is because the romans were all originally pagans, but an emporer forced them to change to christianity. So basically they adapted their old beliefs and celebrations into christianity.
And this is the christianity that has stuck since the romans were the most dominant civilization at that time.
Christians should be celebrating with their families and church families on this day as a coming together to remember Christ’s birth and celebrate it. It is Christ-Mass a mass celebration of the birth of Christ our saviour. Why not celebrate with the giving and receiving of gifts, symbolism for God giving us the gift of Christ?
because Christians want to take over everything. have you seen what they have been doing to our government?
The truth of the matter is that those ‘traditions’ were adopted by the Roman Catholic Church. And up until the last 2 to 3 centuries has been the dominating premise of Christian beliefs & theology. This is no longer the case.
Getting to answering your question. The Catholics adopted these traditions & holidays so they could make themselves appealing to the cultures of those whom they were trying to appeal to & ultimately convert.
Straw man, no true scotsman
I believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. With that being stated, those festivals were sanctioned by the Roman Catholic Church. That is a body of worship that I have chosen to disassociate myself from because of lukewarm Christian doctrine like this and many other things. The RCC cannot understand my faith because they outright refuse to understand their own. They merely stand on their pedestals like politicians, telling me right from wrong when they don’t know how to apply what they are saying in their own lives. And, while I know I am not sinless, I am not going to write a doctrine to make such unbiblical equivocations to declare my own righteousness. That goes against the entire purpose of what Jesus Christ died for.
It seems to me like you already know the answer to this, and just want a confirmation. When Christianity was just budding, they needed to be able to assimilate the people they were conquering or neighboring. They needed to make this foreign religion more appealing to pagans, so they chose a few holidays that were really great and gave these people a Christian reason to celebrate. Christmas was declared the birthday of Jesus by a pope, which means that Catholics at least will treat it essentially as truth. Easter was declared to be when Jesus rose again, so feasting is all well and good. Christians do not celebrate Halloween for religious reasons, so that point is a bit unfair.
Also, not all Christians celebrate these holidays in the pagan way. Some refuse to give presents on Christmas or have mistletoe or trees, realizing this is not related to Christ. However, it would take some serious figuring to get Jesus’s “real” birthday, so the date itself is generally acceptable.
Short answer? They do it out of tradition, because a long time ago people were less critical and free-thinking than they are now. Christianity needed a leg up so they adopted popular rites and associated them with Christ instead. And not all Christians celebrate with pagan rites. Some just go to church and meditate upon the birth of their savior.
Hope this helps.
We should not mix light with darkness.
(Ephesians 5:10-11) Keep on making sure of what is acceptable to the Lord; 11 and quit sharing with [them] in the unfruitful works that belong to the darkness, but, rather, even be reproving [them],
Short answer Christianity IS pagan
Long Anwser after Christianity became the standard religion in the Roman times it had to deal with a small issue, there where many other gods and festivals around. Many other rituals and the likes.
So the only way to keep the people happy was to “water the wine” and mix it all in one big church religion as led by Constantine. Yes indeed taking the “pagan” rituals and ways was the only way to get people to accept Christianity.
What a weak weak weak faith indeed, I would call modern christians Romans. Because they are quite roman indeed. And gnostic Christians, they eschew the roman ways, more close to the original. If there ever was an original.
Well the first question would be. Is is wrong for a Christian to celebrate a holiday? No, Celebrating the 4th of July is not in the Bible but many people use it as an opportunity to praise God for their freedom and their country. It all depends how you celebrate Christmas, what is the purpose? If the purpose is to go waste thousands of dollars on useless stuff you don’t need, make up lies to your kids about a man called santa claus etc then yes this is wrong. If you want to spend time with family to celebrate and praise God for sending the world Jesus Christ, there is nothing wrong with that. The Bible doesn’t say we can’t do something like that. It is all about the purpose in heart.
http://www.carm.org/questions/other-questions/what-are-origins-christmas-and-can-christian-celebrate-it
The church leaders in europe put jesus birth at the end of december because other nordic festival’s and feasts were going on at that time
I disagree.
+ Christmas +
Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ, God the Son.
The angel said to them,
“Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For today in the city of David a savior has been born for you who is Messiah and Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”
And suddenly there was a multitude of the heavenly host with the angel, praising God and saying:
“Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
(Luke 2:10-14)
Christmas is in no way a pagan holiday.
No one knows the exact day when Jesus was born. If a date close to the winter solstice was chosen for Christmas to make conversion of pagans to Christianity easier then what is the harm of that? One could probably find a pagan holiday close to any date on the calendar.
Christmas is celebrated by almost all Christian denominations not just Catholics.
+ Easter +
The English word “Easter” relates to Estre, a Teutonic (German) goddess of the rising light of day and spring. No one seems to know why this English word was used for the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The great feast of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ was celebrated long before the unchristian English word “Easter” was first used. And the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is directly related to the Jewish feast of Passover going back to about 3,000 B.C.E.
Most other languages use the Jewish/Christian word for “Passover” for the great celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ that English speakers call “Easter.”
The Greek term for “Passover” is Páskha. It is the Aramaic form of the Hebrew pesach (meaning passover). Other languages:
Afrikaans: Paasfees
Albanian: Pashkët
Breton: Pask Seder
Catalan: Pasqua
Chamorro: Pasgua
Cornish: Pask
Danish: Påske or Paaske
Dutch: Pasen or Paschen
Esperanto: Paskon
Finnish: Pääsiäistä
French: Pâques
Galician: Pascuas
Icelandic: Páska
Indonesian: Paskah
Italian: Pasqua
Jèrriais: Pâques
Latin: Pascha
Norwegian: Påske
Portuguese: Páscoa
Scottish: Pask
Sicilian: Pasqua
Spanish: Pascuas
Swahili: Pasaka
Swedish: Påsk
Welsh: Pasg
Even in the German provinces of the Lower Rhine where the Teutonic goddess Estre had its origins, the people call the feast Paisken not Ostern.
With love in Christ.
The polite answer here is “the reason for the season is whatever you want it to be”. Basic etymology of the word “Christmas” after all is the “Mass of Christ”.
The mythology of “Christ” however is based on pagan (and Buddhist) mythology. The virgin birth announced by a star, three wise kings, 12 disciples, crucifixion and resurrection after three days are all based on ancient sun worship and astrology.
However the concept of Christmas is that it is a christian holy day, Pagans don’t usually honour Christ….
Christians who celebrate Christmas are not celebrating a pagan festival. They are celebrating the birth of Christ as recounted in the Bible and doing as the shepherds did – and as the angels told them. They rejoice as it is a time of joy, they share peace and good will with each other. They praise God for giving them his Son.
The myth of pagan origins is very pervasive but it is a myth. It was started by Puritans who did not approve of the Catholic feast and even tried to ban it
The first record of Christmas on December 25th is earlier than 350 AD being in a calendar dated to 336 AD so it certainly started earlier than that.
The only pagan festival known to have been on 25th December was a sun festival. This was started by an emperor about 275 AD so was not a tradition, indeed it was quite probably done to try and usurp the Christian celebration. Although there is not an earlier record of a Christmas celebration, there are earlier suggestions from Christian writers that Dec 25th was the right date.
There is NO record of gift giving associated with Mithraism, The gift giving actually originates (besides being a universal idea) with the feast of Saint Nicholas on December 6th when, as they still do in some countries, people gave gifts to children in memory of the Saint’s generosity. Protestant reformers moved it to Christmas in an attempt to ensure only Christ was honoured but they failed because many people simply shifted the Saint (Santa Claus) to Christmas.
Yule is only associated with December 25th because, when they converted to Christianity, the Norse rulers started to hold their winter warrior’s feast (known as holding Yule) at Christmas.
There is nothing detectably Celtic about Christmas at all.
The only Norse myth about Mistletoe is its used to kill Baldur. It is not a fertility symbol.
Christmas trees are related to the tree in the Garden of Eden. Jeremiah does not condemn Christmas trees, he condemns idolatry – carving images out of wood.
The assumptions in your question are, unfortunately, about 100% historically inaccurate..
Simply put for the same reasons they slaughter pagans, witches, other denominations of christians and so on. Power and greed which is the root of most christian religions especially the catholic hate church. Tens of thousands of peoples have been exterminated by them for their power/greed base. In order to have more power one must needs run over other religions and one way was to set the dates of their newly created religion right over existing dates used by many pagan sects. No christmas was not originally a christian date. The belief in the deity of Jesus is theirs but not the dates. It is believed that Jesus was actually born in March. So why have it in December> to run over existing dates. It is just part of the ongoing hate agenda.
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