Since it IS Christmas time......

I just wanted to remind all of our resident Christians how they are celebrating a pagan holiday, stolen by christianity.What's that you say? You already knew that? How does that sit with you? Here is a great site to remind you.Now, christiananswers.net mentions Matthew 1:18-25 and Luke 2:1-20 as the historical record for jesus' birth, both of which fail to pin it down. The closest we can come to any sort of time frame (that I have been able to find so far) is in Luke 1:26:

quote:

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Now in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee, named Nazareth, 27to a virgin pledged to be married to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28Having come in, the angel said to her, Rejoice, you highly favored one! The Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women! 29But when she saw him, she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered what kind of salutation this might be. 30The angel said to her, Don’t be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31Behold, you will conceive in your womb, and bring forth a son, and will call his name ‘Jesus.’ 32He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father, David, 33and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever. There will be no end to his Kingdom. 34Mary said to the angel, How can this be, seeing I am a virgin? 35The angel answered her, The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore also the holy one who is born from you will be called the Son of God. 36Behold, Elizabeth, your relative, also has conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. 37For everything spoken by God is possible. 38Mary said, Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; be it to me according to your word. The angel departed from her.
  —Luke 1:26

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The aforementioned "sixth month" is the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy. Funnily enough, nowhere does it mention what month she got knocked up.As we can see from numerous sources, including my first link, that December 25th was chosen, by the catholic church, in an effort to sway pagans to christianity because of there celebration of Saturnalia, or the winter solstice. This celebration is found to be where a majority of our traditions stem from. Christmas trees (a sign of male virility), wreaths (a symbol of female virilty) etc..My main question is this: christianity has based an entire cult around ONE man, with one of his main claims to fame being that of a virgin birth, yet, you really don't even know what month he was born in?Also, how does it sit with you that you are celebrating a stolen pagan festivity and attributing it to your lord and saviour?

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

Thread copied here from the Since it IS Christmas time...... thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

We could even look at Luke 2:8 that states: if we believe any of the bible, (psst: I don't) even this would lean towards this jesus fella being born in spring at best.So what we have is a random date, chosen by the romans/catholic church, in an effort to supress the pagans and/or make it easier to convert them. Either way, it is an act of deceipt.How, again, is x-mas a religious holiday? (technically speaking)

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

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.

Hi, Hooah. I think there is a general understanding among Christians that Jesus wasn't born in December: either way, this really isn't a big revelation.-----Another point to make: I sure hope you don't celebrate Christmas in your home, because otherwise, this would be an extremely hypocritical thread, don't you think?

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

It may not be news to many, but it seems to me like the birth of their alleged messiah is just kind of like "meh, we'll say it was this day who cares". That, and it was done just for the purpose of stifling other celebrations. THAT seems hypocritical. I celebrate the tradition, not the birth of christ.

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

So it is ok to lie and deceive (and steal birth dates from other religions) in an effort to gain members for your religion?

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

I think everybody here has it the other way around.Here's the situation of the time. The christian faith is expanding, and expanding fast. I mean really fast. And so much that it is very hard to keep track of the ever growing flow of new people coming in the church, all with different backgrounds and pagan belief. It was in order to help in this transitional phase that the church officials decided to ''highjack'' the old pagan beliefs and give them a christian meaning.So they didn't do this to convert everybody to christianity, but did it because everybody was converting to christianity.In any case, was it wrong ? Was it right ? Should they have abolished all the pagan traditions, and then start off with completely new ones with the second and third generations ? Should they have kept it the way it was ?Personnally I don't a schizzles about it all. I mean, modern culture highjacked christmas to make it Santa Clauses party. And most people kept the christian tradition of christmas but gave to it their own, personal meaning, and I'm not condemning anyone for doing so.Although if you are condemning the church for highjacking previous pagan tradition (I'm not saying you are), but then you yourself highjack the previous christian tradition, I will find it a bit hypocrite.

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.

I suppose I could see it that way. But it just seems to me that the birth of jesus should be a bit more important is all. Moreso than to just be able to say: "well, we've got some newcomers, let's celebrate his birthday around their holiday to make them welcome".It just seems a bit morbid that jesus' life means fuck all and his death is revered. It would seem to me then, that it makes anything he did in life mean fuck all too, yes? All that is important is that he died.

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

you know, I think you are right. I guess I assumed it SHOULD matter when it doesn't. I guess my main contention is the actual religious overtones associated with the holiday when, technically, there should be none.

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

Hi, Hooah. Ah, I see. In truth, I don't know why exactness in honoring Christ's birthday isn't more important to Christianity. Of course, I don't think exactness has ever been our strong suit (read the handful of threads about the definition of "kinds," as an example), so it doesn't surprise me that we do this inexactly too. After all, Christianity isn't rocket science. ----- We celebrate the birth of Christ, not the Roman goddess Saturn. What's the difference between you celebrating something on a Christian holiday and a Christian celebrating something on a pagan holiday?-----Let me add another twist: the birthday celebration itself is a pagan tradition, not a biblical/Israelite tradition, so I guess you could say Christmas is a pagan celebration of Jesus.

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Because it is not a christian holiday, technically speaking. Christians adopted the day from other religions BEFORE them. I could just as easily say it's a Persian holiday, right?

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan

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.

Again, here we can point out all of the other deities who were said to be:
-born of a virgin
-born on December 25th
among others, ALL coming before the widespread belief in christianity. Those who don't see that are not wishing to see the whole picture.

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Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people
-Carl SaganFor me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
-Carl Sagan