To wonder why people who appear to dislike religion enjoy Christian celebrations

[Cupcake1985]

I know that most people enjoy Christmas, Easter etc with no regard for the actual Christian basis and meaning of the celebration, but aibu to think that those people should then not get all offended by the religious aspects and sometimes be downright rude about it?? The nativity play, spreading the word of god through carol singing etc..... Dare I mention operation Christmas child?! If you enjoy Christmas then at least try to accept it is actually about the birth of Christ or at least respect that others will celebrate this fact and may try to share that with those around them with the best intentions.

Basically cheer up, be accepting, be kind.

Fair enough friday16. Now to convince the church

So, if we're all influenced by each other, why is it a problem that Christians have adopted pagan symbols at Christmas? Perhaps paganism has also taken on board aspects of other ancient traditions over time.

Would still love answers to this BTW

But what exactly do pagans expect Christians to do about that now? Are we meant to feel responsible for something others did centuries ago?

We call it Christmas because everyone else does. Y'know - so everyone knows what we're on about?

Do you worship Thor? No. Then stop using the word Thursday because it's named after him - Thor's Day.

We've been through this. Haven't you read the read?

Not a Pagan but:

But what exactly do pagans expect Christians to do about that now?

Nothing - except stop pretending that Christmas is exclusively Christian.

Are we meant to feel responsible for something others did centuries ago? No. But see above.

"But what exactly do pagans expect Christians to do about that now? Are we meant to feel responsible for something others did centuries ago?"

Fuck all honestly. Aside from not go on like Christians own the midwinter celebration and all it's associated symbols.

Just letting everyone get on with enjoying what little brightness we get in the winter would be nice really.

The word Easter can be derived from Oster, the old Teutonic form of auferstehen/erstehen meaning resurrection.

I don't think anyone's suggesting Christians "own" any of the symbols or the principle of a midwinter festival.

However there are several posters who have claimed that the origins of Christmas aren't Christian. I think that depends how you define Christmas. If you're thinking of the tree/decoration/time of year etc. then yes.

But to a Christian, the only thing which makes it Christ-mas is remembering Christ's birth. Anything else is secondary, ultimately unnecessary, and definitely not an "origin" of what we celebrate.

Can I also add that you don't have to be Christian to believe in Christ, and his existence, and believing in Christ doesn't automatically make you a Christian.

A lot of other faiths respect the birth of Christ, and his existence on the planet.

It's not an exclusivity club for Christians. Isn't that what the man spent half his life trying to point out!?

No wonder we're in so much of a mess.

You didn't read the OP? Or her mini-rant on the OCC thread which prompted her to post it?

There are rather a lot of people who think that Christmas is Christian and the rest of us are hypocrites for celebrating it.

If, for you, it has a Christian significance, then great. Enjoy it on that basis. And, of course, there's nothing wrong with you including trees, mince pies & crackers - that doesn't make you a hypocrite either. Just someone enjoying the traditions alongside the religious meaning.

We enjoy the traditions without the religious overtones, and that's fine too.

The word Easter can be derived from Oster, the old Teutonic form of auferstehen/erstehen meaning resurrection.

Easter isn't called Easter in German, it's called Oster. Oster and Osterland in German mean "eastern" and are associated with the East, land of the rising sun, spring, all that renewal of life stuff.

I've never heard of it being associated with auferstehen, and I am a bit surprised that the old Teutonic form of auferstehen is relevant, given that the Bible only got translated into German by Luther, somewhat after people stopped speaking Old Teutonic. I do think the other derivation from ?astre or ?ostre in English is much more widely accepted as true.

I am very happy to recognise that for many Christians, the festivities are about the birth of Christ. But the name is not a good argument to support this. It's only "called Christmas" if you speak English.

If you were born further South (in Europe) you'd be calling it "birthday", ie, variants on Noel, Natale, Navidad. So yes, that's a Christian reference, widely shared across Catholic countries. And Germans say Weihnacht(en) which is "holy night".

But further North- Denmark, Sweden, Norway- and you'd be saying Yule (Jul). We called it Geol before we called it Christmas. It's pretty accepted that Yule and variants reflect the old, pre-Christian festivals in the Nordic countries. So if we were having this exact discussion on Nordic Mumsnet, you'd have to concede that the name of Yule reflected the previous faith associated with the holiday, and not the current one.

Coupon: So what do you call the days of the week and the months of the year? What with them being named after Norse and Roman deities that you (presumably) don't believe in...

So, if we're all influenced by each other, why is it a problem that Christians have adopted pagan symbols at Christmas?

I don't think anyone's said it is a problem, have they? In general, the only people who would get worked up about pagan symbolism in Christianity are quasi-Christians who already have a down on Christmas anyway. There's that old joke in which a JW comes to your door and says "do you know that the Christmas tree is a pagan symbol?" and you reply "yes, that's why I've got one".

But the entire Bible is full of "anything your pagan Gods can do, I can do better" --- virgin births, resurrection, babies floating in wicker baskets are all the sort of things that older, particularly Egyptian gods got up to. Krishna and Sargon were put in baskets and floated down rivers. You can't get a fag paper between Isis and the Virgin Mary giving birth to Horus and Jesus respectively. The whole resurrection of Jesus is lifted from the story of Osiris. And so on. You can imagine that from a marketing point of view in 100CE, it was a bit of a problem that the old Gods were all just so much cooler, so Christianity borrowed super-powers, rather in the manner of Marvel and DC trying to outdo each other in cool super-hero comics, to make the story have more excitement.

and if you want to know, "what would Jesus do?" then Happy Christmas in Hebrew is Chag Molad Sameach v'Shanah Tovah or ajmil at-tih?n? bimun?sabah al-m?l?d wa h?il?l as-sanah al-jad?dah in Arabic.

Just reminding people- Jesus didn't speak English. The Bible isn't in English either. English is not the language of Christianity.

It's all been translated, people. Christmas is just what we call it.

In my experience, people can only manage this bit of doublethink when they don't, personally, have a child who has died or been severely disabled. Once that happens, it becomes rather difficult to ignore.

In your experience maybe. But this is completely false. I do not know what it is like to have a child die and I can have no certainty as to what would happen to my personal faith if I did experience it. However, I can say with certainty that not everybody who has experienced it loses their faith. I know a few Christians whose children have died, am aware of several more and, statistically, realise that there must be thousands more spread throughout the world.

The closest thing I know to this level of pain (which I am not saying compares) is that my dad died when I was young. I have a friend whose mum died at around the same age. My friend lost her faith as she couldn't reconcile a loving God with someone who allowed her Mum to die. I didn't lose mine, partly because I actually found it comforting and partly because I found that if I could believe in God in a world where other people's loved ones die then I couldn't logically just not believe now that it had happened to me.

That doesn't make me a better person, a worse person, a less logical person or a stronger or weaker person than my friend, it just makes me different. In the same way I think Christian parents who lose children are different - it breaks the faith of some but others find they still believe. I don't think it's a choice, you just realise that your beliefs have or have not changed.

I do think people who say to you 'I'd be an atheist in your shoes' are very 'off' though. It's an awful thing to say to anyone, let alone a bereaved parent. And doesn't say much about the integrity of their own beliefs.

Jesus didn't speak English.

Ah, but God might have done, apparently. I love the "King James Only" movement(s). Whatever resources we may be running out of, stupidity isn't one of them.

I think having a parent die is different, because it is more natural. We all go through this, unless we die first. My father died young and so did my brother. In my case, my child has not died but has been profoundly disabled, so I am faced with his situation every single day of my remaining life. The unfairness of it is therefore brought home to yuo very directly.

I think one reason we have a different experience is that I have a different sample from you. You know people who are Christian enough to come to church, some of whom have suffered loss. I see all the parents in the clinic, the hospital, the special school, the social club. It's probably a fuller selection of parents in my situation. I have only met one mother who is a Christian in 17 years. I don't suppose that you are as aware of all these parents as I am- because why would you need to go to these places? But I have friends who are doctors treating similar children, and they are not believers either. Not any more.

You are right that it's illogical to believe in god only if bad things don't happen to you... in your case you went in direction A- I will believe even when it happens to me. I suppose I am saying that I went in direction B- why do any of you believe it?

It's hard for me to see the logic in saying: I had a faith which didn't cover the problem of suffering, because I didn't need to think it through. Now I am suffering, it would be illogical to change my mind. To me, it's when you are faced with the reality of the issue, that changing your mind seems right.

It would be far from me to wish more acute suffering on anyone just so I can do the experiment- so I don't. I hope you never have to go through anything awful relating to your child. If you did, though, you might see a bit more clearly what I mean.

and -apologies for drip post- some forms of suffering can be reconciled with faith. Losing a child in an accident, or by some form of human agency, is appalling and terrible, but need not undermine your faith in a god. It's when a child is created already destroyed, from conception, by the direct agency of god, no human intervention whatsoever, that you have to ask these questions.

I totally agree with you that a parent dying is not the same as a child, I definitely wasn't trying to say the two were the same. And I would never presume to state that my faith would hold up to that. I can hope and even it think it would. But I do not know and I don't think less of or judge anyone who loses or changes their faith for any reason.

And yes, you also make a very good point about the different samples. I wouldn't necessarily say that Christians who attend church have a stronger faith than those who don't (there's probably a positive correlation between faith and church attendance but there will be many exceptions) but I have found that, when a child from a church dies or is very ill, the church tends to completely surround the family with love and support before, during and after. People coming from another viewpoint may well say that is suffocating and not allowing them to feel what they truly feel though.

And I don't have any answers or platitudes for what your son and your family go through every day. I think it would inappropriate and insensitive to suggest that I do.

I understand, manic. Thank you for the discussion. I still don't quite understand how people manage to believe, but I do understand that it isn't always something they choose to do.

Have a nice rest of your day :)

Hello sunshine nice to see you, and hope all goes well at home.

Interesting that it's been different at your end. Are you posting from the UK?

The only people who I've ever heard complain about Christmas go on about how "commercial" it has become and how people "forget" that it is apparently solely to celebrate the birth of Christ. Apart from that, I hear Jahova's Witnesses complain about how it is not real and refuse to celebrate it.

Non-religous people just take part in a winter celebration that's about family, forgiveness and love and stuff. I do not actually belive in anything religious, but I the whole nativity thing is fine by me if you want to celebrate that.

Personally, I'd be quite pleased if in 2k years people are celbrating my birthday (even if it was the wrong day of the year) by lavishing gifts upon their loved ones and bringing extended their families together for a big joyfull meal.

I can't picture someone who preached about peace and love having much of a problem with this either.