Re: Taking Christ out of Christmas
Here is some interesting reading, and there is much more if one wants to find out about the origins of certain holidays or rituals practiced in modern day world...and believe it or not, most of the Religious Holidays were instituted by the old Roman Catholic church...and I am NOT railing the Catholics here, just stating a fact anyone can read about in history...and also, most if not all of them were united with a pagan time of worship so as to allow all peoples of any "religion" to have a holiday together...how sweet!!! <br /><br />Origin of Christmas - The Traditions and Controversies<br /><br />For today's Christian, the origin of Christmas is, and should be, the birth of Jesus Christ as recorded in the Bible. Nothing more and nothing less. However, most of what we witness on December 25th each year has absolutely nothing to do with that blessed day, which probably occurred in late summer or early fall about 2,000 years ago. In fact, most of the customs and traditions of Christmas actually pre-date the birth of Jesus, and many of them are downright deceptive in their meaning and origin. Here are a few examples: <br /><br />The date of December 25th probably originated with the ancient "birthday" of the son-god, Mithra, a pagan deity whose religious influence became widespread in the Roman Empire during the first few centuries A.D. Mithra was related to the Semitic sun-god, Shamash, and his worship spread throughout Asia to Europe where he was called Deus Sol Invictus Mithras. Rome was well-known for absorbing the pagan religions and rituals of its widespread empire. As such, Rome converted this pagan legacy to a celebration of the god, Saturn, and the rebirth of the sun god during the winter solstice period. The winter holiday became known as Saturnalia and began the week prior to December 25th. The festival was characterized by gift-giving, feasting, singing and downright **********, as the priests of Saturn carried wreaths of evergreen boughs in procession throughout the Roman temples. <br /><br />Variations of this pagan holiday flourished throughout the first few centuries after Jesus Christ, but it probably wasn't until 336 AD that Emperor Constantine officially converted this pagan tradition into the "Christian" holiday of Christmas.
<br /><br />Christmas Song Revives Religious Debate<br /><br />Mon Dec 6, 8:12 AM ET Oddly Enough - Reuters <br /> <br /><br /><br />ROME (Reuters) - An Italian teacher's efforts to make a Christmas carol more acceptable to young Muslim students by removing the word "Jesus" has rekindled the debate over religious symbols in the Roman Catholic country. <br /><br /> <br /><br />A middle-school teacher in the northern Italian town of Como set off a storm when she told Muslims in her class that if they preferred they could replace the line "this is the day of Jesus" with "this is the day of virtue." <br /><br /><br />"Jesus banned in Christmas songs" the daily Il Giornale, run by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's brother, said in a front-page headline Sunday. <br /><br /><br />"Substituting the word Jesus in a Christmas song is a serious mistake and an offence against the entire Catholic community," Como's mayor, Stefano Bruno, from the center-right Forza Italia (Go Italy) party, told Agi news agency. <br /><br /><br />Religion has been an increasingly prickly issue in Italy as immigrant communities grow. <br /><br /><br />A judge sparked a nationwide controversy a year ago when he ordered that a crucifix be taken off a school wall. Pope John Paul (news - web sites) weighed in saying it was undemocratic and dangerous to try to erase a country's religious symbols. <br /><br /><br />Tension mounted again earlier this year when a nursery school refused to hire a Muslim woman, saying her headscarf could scare the children. <br /><br /><br />But before the latest standoff exploded into a full-blown controversy, the 10- and 11-year-old students resolved the issue by opting to stick to the original lyrics. <br /><br /><br />The director of the school, Pasquale Capria, told reporters on Sunday: "The foreign students themselves told me it wasn't a problem for them to sing Jesus." <br /><br /><br />Foreigners, many of them Muslim, represent about 20 percent of the students at the school. There are some one million Muslims living in Italy, a country of around 57 million people.
