The following post was originally published in December of 2012 on the original Refined4him website at blogger.com. It is here in its original format, unedited. I can no longer guarantee that any links associated with this post are still active. Enjoy and Merry Christmas!

The title of this blog may have gotten your attention. We all are more than familiar with the constant battle during the Christmas season. You know, the one where the Atheists are offended and want “Christ” removed from Christmas, and the Christians fight to keep it CHRISTmas. Of course, how silly would it sound when you shout “Merry Mas”? But you may not be aware of a new battle on the horizon. This is actually the first Christmas that it has shown up on my doorstep. And no, it wasn’t caroling. Would you believe that there are Christians out there who want to remove Christmas from Christ? Yes, I know it sounds hard to believe. But there are many devout Christians out there who proclaim that celebrating Christmas is a sin and Christians should have no part of it. I know you may be saying “Do what now?”. I have had a convincing argument come before me that has told me that it is sinful, and then a convincing argument right behind that one that says it is not. So I have been rendered neutral on the battleground. Therefore, with much research, let me do as a good blogger does and put in my two cents. Please note that following this blog post I will have the links for the two arguments so that you can see where this is coming from.

The History Of Christmas
Well, it seems fitting that before I begin to open this crater of worms, I give you a background to Christmas and it’s origins. As we all know, Christmas was a pagan holiday before it became Christmas. But in my research I was amazed to find that there were more than one religion that was partaking. The Mesopotamians reigned in the New Year with their god Marduk. The Persians and Babylonians got rambunctious with the Sacaea festival. Scandinavians celebrated the Yuletide by burning a Yule log. The Romans celebrated their god Saturn in a festival called Saturnalia which had traditions and festivities that closely mirrored that of modern day Christmas. (information found at http://www.holidays.net/christmas/story.htm). Romans also believed that their sun god Mithra was born on December 25th in a way similar to Christ’s birth. We also need to give a shoutout to our crazy friends over in Germany for honoring their pagan god Oden. (information found at http://www.history.com/topics/christmas). Most of these pagan holidays have something to do with the end of the winter solstice and the slow crawl back to spring, or the death of the sun, or some other weird weather/season related phenomenon.

So now we have just a massive festival of multi-god worshipping and debauchery in the streets throughout many different lands. So how did Jesus get mixed in with all of this? The first recorded date of Christmas being celebrated on December 25th was in 336AD in the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine (he was the first Christian Roman Emperor). A few years later Pope Julius I officially declared that the birth of Jesus would be celebrated on the 25th December. There are many different theories as to why Christmas is celebrated on December 25th. A very early Christian tradition said that the day when Mary was told that she would have a very special baby, Jesus. (This is called the Annunciation) was on March 25th – and it’s still celebrated today on the 25th March. Nine months after the 25th March is the 25th December! March 25th was also the day some some early Christians thought the world had been made and also the day that Jesus died on when he was an adult. (http://www.whychristmas.com/customs/25th.shtml).

In various findings I had found that creating Christmas at the same time as these pagan holidays had caused a “meshing” of traditions. Many of these included pagan traditions of feasting with family and friends, gift exchanging, carolling, and eventually tree decorating. 

So what have we learned by far in the “Reader’s Digest version” of the history of Christmas? We have learned that before Christmas, the winter solstice/December 21st was celebrated by pagans as idol/false god worshipping using customs that are still celebrated today at Christmas. A couple of guys got together and said “Hey, they have a big celebration honoring all their gods. Let’s have one too!” And so Christmas was born on December 25th to honor the birth of Jesus Christ. The only problem with this is that the real birth of Jesus was never recorded, and so therefore probably was never on or around December 25th. It was just a tactic to “join in the crowd” with all the festivities and even try to mesh Christianity and paganism. Some scholars say this was in effort to convert pagans, some say it was to please them so that they wouldn’t have to give up their practices for Christ. This is one argument that the Anti-Christmas Christians stand by. The other arguments are that Christians shouldn’t celebrate on a pagan holiday, they shouldn’t acknowledge anything that originated in paganism, and that Christmas is a sin because the bible does not command us to celebrate it.

This post is only the can opener to the can of worms. It’s all downhill from here! Before we move on, I urge you to check out the above links on the origins of Christmas, and the following links on the arguments from both sides that has inspired me to write on this topic. In just a few days I will be posting Part 2 on whether it is a sin to simply say “Merry Christmas”. Until then…God bless!

The link that inspired me to throw away Christmas: http://www.daveblackonline.com/why_we_no_longer_celebrate_chris.htm

The links that inspired me to continue to celebrate Christmas:
http://americanvision.org/3866/of-christmas-and-christmas-trees/
http://americanvision.org/895/pagan-roots-of-christmas/