Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!know!sdd.hp.com!usc!ucsd!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: walsh@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Christmas should be April 15th Message-ID: Date: 9 Nov 90 05:55:02 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 38 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , brians@hpcljms.cup.hp.com (Brian Sullivan) writes: > > For all of the religious believers out there who question the "scientific > method" and believe the Bible literally maybe you should look a the > current religious mis-beliefs that occur today. > > 1. Christmas, one of the most celebrated holidays of the Christian > religion should not be celebrated in December. The stories in > the Bible are quite detailed and speak of Mary and Joesph going > to the town of their Joesph's familiy for the Census and to pay > their taxes to the Roman Empire. The history of the Roman Empire > indicates that this took place in April or May. This is more in > line with the shepherd being in the fields when Jesus was born. > During December the shepherds don't have much to do in the fields. > If you want to celebrate the birth of Jesus I would suggest that > April 15th would be an good approximation of his birth date and > has some modern relevance to the historical events surrounding his > birth. > Like the moderator said, nobody i holds this is the actual day of Christ's birth. It's just the day we celebrate it. I heard that the earliest Christmas we know about was in the middle of January or thereabouts, and it was moved to Dec.25 to counteract pagan Saturnalia (this happened in the 4th century, i think). The Armenian church said they didn't feel the need to move it because there was no Saturnalia in Armenia so they still celebrate Christmas in January. The Western Church also moved All Saints Day and All Souls day to Nov 1 & 2 to combat Holloween (in America it looks like Holloween won), and even before then St John the Baptist day was moved to June 24 to replace pagan Summer Solstice festivals. This doesn't strike me as dishonest, people were taking holidays and celebrating anyway, the Church just tried to give them something Christian to celebrate. ando.