Ancient mostly ignorant humans got frightened as winter approached and the days got shorter. Not understanding our solar system or planetary orbits or axial tilts, they feared the sun spending less time in the sky, and the days getting shorter, was permanent -- and that things would never go back to more sun and longer days. When they began to notice that around Dec. 21 (on our calendar) every year, the days stopped getting shorter and started getting longer again, they celebrated. It was, to them, a re-birth; the earth plunged into the cold and dark of winter only to awaken again to the promise of spring and new life. And the cycle was reliable.
Christians took over the holiday, to pretend their magical god-man was born at the time of the beginning of re-awakening and new life, but their takeover doesn't change the real "reason for the season" -- the end of the days getting shorter, the beginning of the return of the sun high in the sky, and the promise of another cycle of new life and warmth.
Celebrate *that.* In fact and as metaphor. Nearly all of us here were in the darkness of ignorance and delusion in the church, and we broke that cycle to emerge to new life, new possibilities, new and accurate knowledge. For each of us, our winter solstice of darkness has passed, and we have (or are in the process of) emerged into the dawn of spring.
THAT is worth celebrating. "Wondrous is our great blue ship that sails around the mighty sun, and joy to everyone that rides along." (Jeff Lynne)
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/16/2015 11:10AM by ificouldhietokolob.
If Christmas means quivering in ignorant superstitious fear, while hanging out with your friends and family chomping down roast hauch of venison, puddings of flour suet dried fruit, chugging flagons of ale, delicately nibbling brussels sprouts, apples and chestnuts, well mixed wth kisses, hugs and dances, then let the terror begin!
well hoop into a time machine and change all that. unless you can find a way to introduce new pagan traditions to slowly change away from a baby birthday which doesn't even hit December!
Thank you, Hie! You just wrote all of us a lovely Christmas Card!
Me--I like red ornaments on green trees, food, presents, twinkle lights, and shiny things!
Simple? Not simple at all! I've been working and playing very hard. I've been alone, off and on, some Christmases, but never lonely. Cult-free Christmases have been the best, ever!
We have decorated very little. Our son and his family will be here along with our daughter and my brother. The fact I have my birth family to share it with (via phone and skype) for the first time makes this Christmas pretty special....and I'm generally a grinch.
One of the things I love about the "returning of the sun" is that almost EVERY religion has a festival of lights of some sort....undoubtedly left over from our paleolithic days...whew! Sun came back!
I tend to celebrate EVERYTHING. Chanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa...I even fast during Ramadan. I am totally willing to celebrate...probably from decades of being put to sleep in Sacrament Meetings and RS.
Party On!
(I AM religious and DO believe in a creator. That being said, I also have a degree in Physics....so I am aware that there is a chance I'm totally delusional re: Religion.LOL)
It is a secular myth that Christians adopted an already existing pagan holiday. Telesphorus, 2nd bishop of Rome (129-138) spoke of Dec. 25 celebrations, as did Theophilus, bishop of Caesarea, same period, and Hippolytus who identified the 25th as the Lord's birthday in 200 A.D.
Emperor Aurelian established the 25th as the official solstice in 275 A.D., and the Romans did not designate Dec. 25 a holiday ("Birth of the Unconquered Sun") until 362 A.D. It was the Romans who adopted an established Christian holiday.
caffiend Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > It is a secular myth that Christians adopted an > already existing pagan holiday. Telesphorus, 2nd > bishop of Rome (129-138) spoke of Dec. 25 > celebrations, as did Theophilus, bishop of > Caesarea, same period, and Hippolytus who > identified the 25th as the Lord's birthday in 200 > A.D. > > Emperor Aurelian established the 25th as the > official solstice in 275 A.D., and the Romans did > not designate Dec. 25 a holiday ("Birth of the > Unconquered Sun") until 362 A.D. It was the Romans > who adopted an established Christian holiday.
Sorry, no sale. The Romans celebrated "Saturnalia" as long as there were Romans. The temple to Saturn in Rome was dedicated in 497 BCE. Saturnalia was a "pre-solstice" festival, with public events running until Dec. 17 on their calendar, and then private in-home rituals from then to the week after the solstice, all of which were "public holidays."
December 17 was the first day of the astrological sign Capricorn, the house of Saturn, the planet named for the god. Its proximity to the winter solstice (December 21-December 23 on the Julian calendar was endowed with various meanings by both ancient and modern scholars: for instance, the widespread use of wax candles (cerei, singular cereus) may refer to "the returning power of the sun's light after the solstice."" Dec. 19, two days after the last public Saturnalia celebration, was designated as a day of "gift giving," documented as early as 300 BCE.
Aurelius didn't declare the 25th the "official solstice" at all. He declared the cult of Sol Invictus an "official Roman cult" (alongside other traditional ones) in 274 CE (not 275), giving first official approval of the Dec. 25th Sol Invictus holiday, but it had been celebrated by the non-official cult before that for centuries.
The Roman cult to Sol is continuous from the "earliest history" of the city until the institution of Christianity as the exclusive state religion.