w00t for teh buddha boy

phil_stl wrote: Hasn't someone told that boy about Jesus?  It's crazy that on CHRISTmas some writes an article like this about the re-incarnation of Buddha. What is going on with people nowadays!!!!

Regardless of whether phil was being sarcastic (unclear), I will go ahead and note that Christmas as we know is in fact NOT about Jesus, and it never was.  You have all been lied to.

Darur wrote: Clark Kent wrote: Regardless of whether phil was being sarcastic (unclear), I will go ahead and note that Christmas as we know is in fact NOT about Jesus, and it never was.  You have all been lied to. I beg to differ but I could be mistaken. Christmas itself is about the birth of Jesus now and has been for several centuries, so yes, it is about the birth of Jesus.  Before that , however, Christmas was the celebration of Adam and Eve. Christmas is celebrated now, however, because at the time of its creation pagans celebrated the winter solstice, yule, and other such events.  The church knew it couldn't compete with the pagan rituals so it adopted their celebrations. So, no, the original winter celebrations had nothing to do with Jesus and the later Christan celebrations also had little to do with Jesus, but today, the day of Christmas has everything to do with Jesus

This was poorly stated on my part, but you obviously got part of my gist.  What Christmas "is" about, of course, depends mostly on the person celebrating.  If you think about Jesus during Christmas, then it is obviously about Jesus for you.  If you don't, then it isn't.

What I was really getting was the extent to which the "standard" Christmas traditions have nothing to do with Christ at all.

As you point out, the current timing of Christmas was set by the Catholics as they were bringing Christianity to Northern Europe.  But it goes further.  Christmas trees, Christmas presents - not of Christian origin.  Christmas lights - very arguably not of Christian origin.  In many parts of the world the Christmas traditions are the EXACT same traditions as for the pagan holidays that Christmas replaced.  In some parts, even the same words are used.  "Yuletide" is just butchered Scandinavian for "Christmas time", where "Yul" or "Jul" is the current word for Christmas in those languages.  "Jul" is also the name for the old winter solstice. 

Scandinavia in general may be the best example, both because "jul" was the specific holiday that Pope Gregory was trying to cover up with Christmas.  The current celebration of Christmas in most of Scandinavia today is quite similar to the way Jul was celebrated pre-Christianity, and many of the traditions (mistletoe, anyone?) have been exported to other parts of the world.  The Wikipedia article on "Yule", while a bit shaky, has some interesting info on point and is generally accurate.

So - My point is simply that Christmas is about Christ if you want it to be, but Christ is not intrinsic to the global holiday we know as "Christmas".  Christmas is celebrated by Buddhists and atheists and many others, who obviously don't particularly care about Jesus at all.  It is a holiday with strong pagan roots that was co-opted by Christianity, and has since been co-opted by secular capitalism.

Darur wrote: Ahh, now I see what your saying, and I agree, just one little bit of nitpicking if you will .  Christmas lights are often traced back to Martin Luther who put candles in his tree and began the German tradition, so it can be easily argued as a Christan tradition.

:)

I agree about the Christmas TREE lights - that's my understanding as well.  My understanding about the EXTERIOR Christmas lighting, however, is that it is (somewhat obviously) a midwinter celebration holdover.