In many places surveyed, 20% or more of all adults have left their childhood religious group. Christianity and Buddhism have had especially large losses. Pew Research Center.
No. I mean, first of all let’s start with the fact that both Winter solstice and Spring Equinox were so-called pagan holidays that Christianty subsumed. Right? Let’s start there.
Then let’s understand that those so-called pagan holidays were traditions based on earlier - much earlier - observances. And those observances were astronomical in origin.
The winter solstice is when the sun stops moving for three days - it rises in the same location whereas all the time before that it had been moving slightly every day.
After those three days it starts moving back. That’s the birth. Life is born again. We’re going to make it around the sun another time. That sort of thing.
Spring / Vernal equinox is when we make sure everyone has progeny. Rabbits. Flowers. Eggs. Chrisitanity decided to appropriate this one to mark Jesus’ ascent into heaven. Fine. But irrelevant. Because it has nothing to do with life on earth - very literally, it’s about leaving earth and going to heaven.
That’s why there’s such a disconnect about crucifixion and rabbits and eggs. They don’t have anything to do with each other because the church yoinked a pagan tradition to keep people from celebrating it outside the church.
That makes a lot of sense. Until you consider that around Winter solstice, Christians don’t celebrate the resurrection, yhey celebrate the birth. How do you explain that disconnect?
This explains some of the reasoning, although because it was 350 CE they can’t confirm anything with 100% certainty. Such is history.
What is certain to anyone who has studied it even a little bit is that the winter solstice was near-universally recognized by all cultures prior to the common era.
December 25 is very often the solstice, or close enough to it that it was selected by some as the annual celebration for their deity of choice. As the article notes, in Rome that was the birthday of Sol Invictus. It’s also the birthday of Saturn, Mithras, and depending on whether you believe some fourth-century Christian authors, also Horus.
So Pope Julius “chose” - note that no one is in any doubt the date was selected, it wasn’t like Jesus’ old birthday cards were found and everyone knew that was his actual birthday - Pope Julius chose Dec 25 as the annual celebration day for Jesus. That became known as his birthday. But it wasn’t. What it WAS was the winter solstice.
Like all religion, it can be messed up and carried on.
Sort of like when the winter solstice turned into “dead and buried three days, then rose again” and a bunch of zombie religions are still around.
That’s for Spring (rebirth, Easter), not Winter.
Christmas is for Winter, it celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. It came from Saturnalia, probably the most important holiday of Roman society.
No. I mean, first of all let’s start with the fact that both Winter solstice and Spring Equinox were so-called pagan holidays that Christianty subsumed. Right? Let’s start there.
Then let’s understand that those so-called pagan holidays were traditions based on earlier - much earlier - observances. And those observances were astronomical in origin.
The winter solstice is when the sun stops moving for three days - it rises in the same location whereas all the time before that it had been moving slightly every day.
After those three days it starts moving back. That’s the birth. Life is born again. We’re going to make it around the sun another time. That sort of thing.
Spring / Vernal equinox is when we make sure everyone has progeny. Rabbits. Flowers. Eggs. Chrisitanity decided to appropriate this one to mark Jesus’ ascent into heaven. Fine. But irrelevant. Because it has nothing to do with life on earth - very literally, it’s about leaving earth and going to heaven.
That’s why there’s such a disconnect about crucifixion and rabbits and eggs. They don’t have anything to do with each other because the church yoinked a pagan tradition to keep people from celebrating it outside the church.
That makes a lot of sense. Until you consider that around Winter solstice, Christians don’t celebrate the resurrection, yhey celebrate the birth. How do you explain that disconnect?
This explains some of the reasoning, although because it was 350 CE they can’t confirm anything with 100% certainty. Such is history.
What is certain to anyone who has studied it even a little bit is that the winter solstice was near-universally recognized by all cultures prior to the common era.
December 25 is very often the solstice, or close enough to it that it was selected by some as the annual celebration for their deity of choice. As the article notes, in Rome that was the birthday of Sol Invictus. It’s also the birthday of Saturn, Mithras, and depending on whether you believe some fourth-century Christian authors, also Horus.
So Pope Julius “chose” - note that no one is in any doubt the date was selected, it wasn’t like Jesus’ old birthday cards were found and everyone knew that was his actual birthday - Pope Julius chose Dec 25 as the annual celebration day for Jesus. That became known as his birthday. But it wasn’t. What it WAS was the winter solstice.