Ideas for a "Jesus Free Christmas"

[deepinthewoods]

My niece and her Oh will be coming to stay with us over christmas, she was born and lives abroad. I can't wait and want to make it special for her.
She was raised in a very religious- christian- home, and part of that ( I won't bore you with too many details) was the fact that although her family celebrated christmas massively, it was very centered around the church.
She was forbidden to mention santa Claus, they had no tree, no mistletoe, didn't hang up stockings, gifts very low key etc. these were considered pagan and therefore evil aspects of christmas.

She is an adult now and an athiest. She also wants to experience a "jesus free christmas" her words- this year-she has never experienced one.

I am an athiest anyway so have always had a secular christmas- no jesus here either, but I am looking for ideas to have a memorable secular/pagan christmas for my niece and our family. Any ideas?

we also have an Easter tree, bought it at tescos, a tabletop small tree with small plastic eggs hanging from it. we added some chicks, and the palm crosses we did at church.

I have an Easter tree too- I have a German friend and saw hers, apparently they are common in Germany. Mine has little chicks, ribbons, baskets, eggs, flowers, tiny rabbits. No religious stuff though. The tree itsels a whopping great piece of forsythia in water so it blooms over the week indoors.

The catholic church was quite clever at incorporating pagan beliefs into its dogma though wasn't it? Making it more pallitable and easier to spread itself around.

I think Christianity in general was very clever at this. The priests I know (only two) and the Nuns attached to the church are fairly enlightened about things and having this type of discussion is fine with them. Likewise an Anglican vicar I know (hah...making myself sound right religious...I really am not) is very keen on discussing origins of various Christian festivals.
Am aware though that many very conservative religious folk don't like this kind of talk which I think is a shame. It takes nothing fro them to say..."we celebrate Easter and Christmas at times which incorporated older festival times because we don't know when Jesus as born and when he died".

I'm Pagan, and I actually set the day/night of the Solstice aside to not be about Christmas. That's just me. Otherwise, I love a good month-long secular Christmasy celebration.

There are so many wonderful foodish things that are culturally attached to Christmas. It's the baking and making of them, not just the eating of them. Gingerbread houses are always fun, even as an adult. I also go a bit overboard with the shiny-things-and-lights. I've somehow wound up with all my family's Christmas decorations and things and I put most of them out despite myself. Although, somehow, my Nativity always ends up with extra guests - dragons, and Doctor Who, and other fabulous beasties. (I suppose you might consider leaving that particular feature out.) There's quite a bit of non-Jesusy Christmas music about as well. My favourite is Fairytale of New York, which might say more about me than I intend it to.

Really, it's about the food and the people.
My family had the best whipped cream 'fight' after Christmas dinner one year - I'd like to see that tradition revived, but my mum's never been foolish enough to make an entire bowl of whipped cream since.

Just have to say I was raised Christian, became a pagan as a teenager (that went down weel), then reconverted to Christianity when I was in mid 20's, so I get both sides of the arguments.

Growing up we celebrated Christmas had Christmas trees, Father Christmas, all the trimmings, went to church, learnt about the birth of Jesus etc. celebrated Easter with Easter eggs (no Easter bunny in my day though). personally I don't get why some Christians completely throw out all the traditions, some are pagan of course, but many aren't. Teaching kids that Santa Claus is Satan is just horrible and historically incorrect and blatant ignorance - Santa is the word for Saint in many European languages and Santa Claus, is an anglicised version of Sinterklaas the Dutch Saint otherwise known as St. Nick who had a list of naughty and nice children and gave out sweets from a big bag. Not very devil like.

My brother has introduced us to a new tradition (very pagan I think) since he moved to Sweden - the Yulebok, or Christmas goat, which brings gifts to the children and has something to do with Odin. They make Yulebok effigies out of straw (you can buy them in IKEA), and the tradition where he's been living is to then set fire to said goat after Christmas (no religious reason, I think they got drunk and just decided it would be fun). We as an otherwise Christian family are happy to let him do this, why not? We're not so easily offended. But OP you could add it to a list of non Christian things to do if you fancy a Christmas goat bonfire in the garden?

Oh yes... And gingerbread houses madly over decorated with sweets. You can get them in ikea too!

Loving these ideas- Christmas goat sounds amazing as does a bonfire. Keep these ideas coming. I emailed my niece today and she can't wait. She is in Athens atm at an academic conference and my sister is worried sick that she may be influenced by ancient Greek gods.

You need a Santa Strippogram.

cowsarwscary- really? is that something you have experience of?

Santa stripogram?? Oh my!!!

Nigella usually has some fun Christmas cocktail recipes. In fact her whole book Nigella Christmas looks fab, if you're into serious cooking ;)

I had a rabidly christian upbringing, too, and it has taken a lot of therapy to get over it, so I understand where your niece is coming from, poor thing. If her parents were alcoholics, her messed up upbringing would make more sense but her parents' drug of choice is religion. Shame, shame, SHAME your niece has got God and the church all mixed up, though, as if they are the same thing (they so are not). To my complete surprise I am now a christian but have a deep and abiding loathing for 'religion', precisely because it is often a form of abuse = the very opposite of God.

Thus sayeth I (sorry).

I went to a baptist service the other day and they use the christmas tree to make a cross on easter sunday and the congregation decorate it with fresh flowers - tis lovely. Completely besides the point of your thread in a way, except that a lot of churches have a christmas tree in the church at christmas (don't tell your religious nut sister, though). Didn't the church anyway nick the pagan winter solstice for Christmas?

Great ideas on your thread - how exciting. Go the whole hog and spoil her completely. I still have a stocking and I'm old. Ish (or over 14, anyway).

onapromise and jakebullet you may be trying to grapple with the sacramental nature of Catholic theology, matter is not bad or evil to Catholics and everything can be sanctified and brought into the love of God. Catholics believe that the created world is good and that God lurks everywhere "In Him we live, and move and have our being". Due to this theology Catholicism is very sensual and makes use of all the senses during worship and prayer.

Although often in the threads here writers seem to want to romance a pagan past and then skip straight to the Reformation when discussing spirituality in Britian, the long period when Britain was Catholic lasted well over a thousand years. People who lived in these isles were not press-ganged to adopt Christianity either, it was freely chosen and they were evangelized by individuals or small groups. The implication from some comments is that this was the sinister work on a Christian machine rather than unarmed monks in robes. Christianity must have offered something to the early peoples of the British Isles as they abandoned their earlier beliefs or melded them into Christianity.