Since it IS Christmas time......

I would like to say that it probably doesn't make a great deal of difference to most Christians. They are simply days set aside to celebrate the birth of their lord and saviour and nothing more. Yes - it was a pagan festival, and if this made it easier to convert gentiles to the true religion of god and deliver them into salvation then all the better!It's the same with me: I consider this a festival celebrating my family ties and friendships. Where for a few days everything is about other people and happy times and tolerating each other's shortcomings and the like. It makes no odds to me that it stems from the Saturnalia or has developed more recently under the auspices of Christianity.

By necessity religions have to do this But seriously, what's the lie? It's a date used to celebrate the birth of the long awaited messiah. I don't think Christians today consider it to be the anniversay of the birth, just a date set aside for the celebration. I'm sure some people thought it was the date of Christ's birth, and used all sorts of funky logic to get to it - but that isn't usually intentional deception.After all - what early Roman Catholics or what have you did to gain converts doesn't impact on the truth (or lack thereof) of the miraculous birth of Jesus...and if they tried to convince people that the 25th (or whichever other nearby date) was the date of Christ's birth while also knowing that it wasn't true then I think most Christians would agree that was dishonest.

Yeah - the early Christians did have a problem. How do they convince people that an obscure Palestinian apoclyptic Jew who was executed by the Romans presumably on the charge that he claimed (or people claimed on his behalf) that he was the king of the jews.The fact that he was executed is important. And early Christians needed to deal with this. One solution was instead of hiding or trying to play down the execution, to make it the centre piece. Try and argue that it could be no other way that he was executed. And suddenly the death becomes more important than his life. Which I think is the direction Paul went in.

Less than that stupid documentary, Zeitgeist claims.
That wouldn't change that it is just a date during which celebrations take place that some people use to celebrate the birth of one person, and other people celebrate the rededication of the Holy Temple, the Signature of the Constitution of the Republic of China, Odin, the coming fertility, the hunt, African Culture, the victory of good over evil, or of course "Holiday" (celebrating whatever the Pastafarian decides). True, but its equally easy to focus on these kinds of details, and not on other ones - missing the big picture in the opposite direction so to speak.

Ah - then excuse my tone, if it seems offish. If you continue to study things like this, you'll have a lot of those moments. It really is astonishing what people don't realize about the origins of their own beliefs, and learning about the origins of beliefs you once does have a certain unique quality to it. Enjoy!

Christmas is a Christian holy day, the clue being in the title Just like hanukkah is a Jewish one.However, it appears us evil secularists have stolen the name of Christmas and used it to describe what we are celebrating too. So I suppose Christians are going to have to get used to the fact that Christmas is not only a holiday that occurs at the same time as other religions holidays, but it also refers to a secular festivity as well.