h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well? Any thoughts on the matter? I belong to no religion, but my family still celebrates Christmas. What does Christmas really mean nowadays?

And no treading on anyone's toes or starting flame wars!

GP

Christmas was originaly a pagan festival. Holly, Ivy and Mistletoe were sacred to the Druids. The 25th of December was taken by the Roman church along with many other things from the Roman cult of Mithras. So just have fun and enjoy yourself!

Alji

I think that these days Christmas is mainly a commercial venture. However, I don't think that takes away the joy of gathering together with friends and family, no matter what beliefs you have. I'm extremely excited this year because I get to spend the holiday with my family this year. And I'm not religious either.

Even if you are not religious, you can still live with part of the spirit of Christmas, which is "Peace to people of good will". This can be done by being with your family and friends and by the giving of simple gifts. The other part of the spirit of Christmas, "Glory to God in the Highest" we will have to leave to the religious people.

It always amazes me how much food is bought for what is basically a sunday roast, and how much the UK slows down for what 3 days worth of Bank Holiday (only one more than Easter).

The BBC has just announced that the average Christmas expenditure will be £556 per person. That makes it over a grand per couple. Hmm.

That said, I think in the Northern Hemisphere we do need something to mark the turn of the year, it is dreich enough otherwise.

I was blessed with a large and fairly stress-free family, so the Christmasses of my childhood and early adulthood were gentle, warm, and fun.

I see it as a chance to rest and recuperate, and I am going on a Womens' Winter Retreat run by the Friends of the Western Buddhist Order. It will be tough, and I am not entirely looking forward to it. But it will be a punctuation point in the year.

Ben

Sorry to have to dissagree with you Aljiis but Christmas (look at the name) was never a Pagan festival. It was however foisted upon Pagans as you say in order to usurp an exhisting festival and some of the elements of the Pagan festival were incorperated in order to gain favour.

Modern Christmas has undergone a similar transition with the modern gods of commercialism foisting the notion of spending and buying upon us. Interestingly as we move towards a more secular society the "traditional" images that we retain are those akin to Paganism (the holly, the ivy, the "Christmas" tree).

The symbolism predominant at Christmas time is of a jolly fat old Santa with bundles of presents. I'm afraid the image of a baby born in poverty no longer cuts the mustard.

PP

Isn't that what religion all round has become - just a set of guidelines to live life, with little spirituality involved?

Christmas itself..the name and the specific reasons for celebrating...Baby Jesus et al, was not celebrates on the 25th of December. Yule-tide however was. And this is what was nicked along with the holly, mistletoe, the yule log etc etc.

I ain't religious in any sense of the work. I use this tiem to go home and see family. And buy them prezzies. Not to celebrate anything except that I appreciate my family, would love to see them more and buy then silly things every day of the year if i could. I can't so I go overboard. Who cares?

*15 days and counting till I go home to the smell of the pot roast and the satellite TV...not that I'm counting.....*

So they changed the name! The cult of Mithras was a pagan religion that preceded Christianity and had all the elements of the Christian myth of the birth of the Son of God.

Followers of Mithras :-

believed that he was born of a virgin in a stable on the winter solstice--frequently December 25 in the Julian calendar (the emperor Aurelian declared December 25 to be the official birthday of Mithras, circa 270 CE)

Attended by shepherds who brought gifts;

He was worshiped on Sundays;

He is shown with a nimbus, or halo, around his head;

Said to take a last supper with his followers when he returned to his father;

Believed not to have died, but to have ascended to heaven, whence it was believed he would return at the end of time to raise the dead in a physical resurrection for a final judgement, sending the good to heaven and the wicked to hell, after the world had been destroyed by fire;

Granted his followers immortal life following baptism.

They followed a leader called a 'papa' (pope), who ruled from the Vatican hill in Rome;

Celebrated the atoning death of a savior who has resurrected on a Sunday;

Celebrated sacramenta (a consecrated meal of bread and wine), termed a Myazda (corresponding exactly to the Catholic Missa (mass), using chanting, bells, candles, incense, and holy water, in remembrance of the last supper of Mithra).

The emperor Constantine was a follower of Mithra until he declared December 25 the official birthday of Jesus in 313 CE and adopted the cult of Christianity as the state religion.


BTW the Romans called Christians atheists because the did not believe in the gods of Rome.
The images we retain are pagan (Holly Mistletoe etc.). However, Santa Claus is Christian inasmuch as Saint Nicholas became the patron saint of children.
St. Nicholas, whose feast day is December 6, is also the patron of seafarers, scholars, bankers, pawnbrokers, jurists, brewers, coopers, travelers, perfumers, unmarried girls, brides, and - robbers.

The earliest record of an evergreen tree being used and decorated (but without lights) for Christmas is 1521 in the German region of Alsace.

Many European churches stand on the site of a pagan Yew grove. The tree was looked on as a symbol of everlasting life (the Yew can live for more than a thousand years).

Alji

I celebrate Yule because it is a part of my culture from before it was infected by Christianity. And humans need celebrations. It is also a fairly secular thing, since solstice is a global thing. Except around equator of course. A lot of people of course do it because of nostalgia, and because it is an excuse to get presents. I think we shoudl reinvent the whole thing. Start a solstice celebration, where gifts weren't allowed. Just where people could be with the ones they loved, and forget about the rest of the world for a day.

I like the idea of the Christmas tree. Some german guy had a lot of trees he didn't know what to do with. And managed to make people put them into their living room and decorate them. Quite a talent for marketing.

For me Christmas is a good time to get together with my family and have a bit of a celebration. Its name, and its religious connections, are quite arbitrary. Call it what you want, it is one time of the year when everyone makes an effort to get together to enjoy each other's company.

Somehow my last posting broke the house rules!!!

Xmas for us is 2 days of bad tv and most of the shops are shut. We actively avoid our relatives as they are into the whole stress and materialism aspect - yawn.

We do have a great few days planned for the winter solstice and yule though. Good food, good drink, no ridiculous pressie buying frenzy, and lastly but by no means leastly a good old druid ritual under our favourite willow tree!

Sounds like a bundle of laughs

Not sure how your last posting is supposed to have broken house rules. All that you said may well be true but, can you deny that an earlier Pagan festival has been nicked first by Christianity in order to manipulate the masses and to replace the older order with an oppressive regieme and that secondly, that we are currently undergoing a similar process again?

PP Cynic Hons.

I'm an agnostic and I love Christmas I like the food, the booze, the great and crappy stuff on telly, the general atmosphere!

I'm an athiest, and I love Christmas too. Too be honest, I loathe christanity. Christains are mostly pretty decent.

I think Christmas has been usurbed again by modern consumerism. Christ is slowly being replaced by a Santa Claus that was orginally drawn as a Coca-Cola ad.

As a matter of fact, I'm procrastinating right now. I should be putting up the lights outside.

Well it's back now so whatever it was, it has passed the sensors now. For all you non-religious ones out there, hope you enjoy your time off, I will! Oh BTW what have you planned for New Year's Eve?

Alji

So Lurcher, good food and drink is ?
Do decorations and presents really make it so much better?

No !
Yes ! Especially when shared with friends AND relatives. But perhaps I`m lucky in that I can live without shops for two days, find that TV is not all bad,and am probably a bit stressed and materialistic myself!
To each his own.
Merry Christmas