Ok lets start talking w/a controversial topic!

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Posted by WinterBride08

At first I was surprised at that girl being an atheist and celebrating christmas...but after thinking about it, i'm not anymore...why? Christmas doesn't seem to be focused on religion that much anymore anyway...much of the focus is on other things, things that have absolutely nothing to do with religion, so why not?

Many holidays used to focus on religion (like valentine's day), but now, religion has nothing to do with these holidays...which explains why an atheist would see nothing wrong in celebrating it...

just my two cents

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agreed. i am not religious and celebrate christmas and i LOVE christmas!

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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this is what i was gonna post about...If youre religious then you know that christmas is not the actual birth of jesus, and even many non-religious people do know this so them celebrating christmas can have nothing to do with religion

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Posted by Jessie062108

sounds like she celebrates the over-commercialized version of it...now a days people don't seem to associate christmas with religion...sad but true

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this is very true

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Posted by Espo22

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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this is what i was gonna post about...If youre religious then you know that christmas is not the actual birth of jesus, and even many non-religious people do know this so them celebrating christmas can have nothing to do with religion

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I 100% agree with this statement! I tried to skip around that, but that is why I feel christmas doesn't have much (if anything at all) to do with religion....

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Posted by WinterBride08

At first I was surprised at that girl being an atheist and celebrating christmas...but after thinking about it, i'm not anymore...why? Christmas doesn't seem to be focused on religion that much anymore anyway...much of the focus is on other things, things that have absolutely nothing to do with religion, so why not?

Many holidays used to focus on religion (like valentine's day), but now, religion has nothing to do with these holidays...which explains why an atheist would see nothing wrong in celebrating it...

just my two cents

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this is very true, i definately agree

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Posted by WinterBride08

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Posted by Espo22

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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this is what i was gonna post about...If youre religious then you know that christmas is not the actual birth of jesus, and even many non-religious people do know this so them celebrating christmas can have nothing to do with religion

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I 100% agree with this statement! I tried to skip around that, but that is why I feel christmas doesn't have much (if anything at all) to do with religion....

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I know alot of religious people though that will still associate christmas with the birth of jesus but then i also know some religious people who actually don't like it because people are believing in something that is not true and don't know the real facts.

So, I got you girls talking, but now I didnt finish 1/2 of my work

I'm agnostic and celebrate christmas because in my fam it was always about, setting a day asside to get together, set differences asside, it was about pretty lights and trees, santa, and hot cocoa-- not the jesus part
so i guess i dont think it its weird.... I love christmas, but I'm not religious...

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Posted by Snowflake08

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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i actually read that it is thought to be that he was born more towards Easter and spring than dec 25

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yeah i think it is around april

here is something i found on a site, its an extremely long article so i won't post all of it but its them trying to calculate the real birth date of jesus which they have to figure out based on jewish holidays and things that happened in israel at the time

Most Gentile Christians wouldn't bother to speculate about the time when Yeshua (Jesus) was born. They celebrate it on December 25th even though they may suspect that there is no Biblical basis for choosing that date. However, there are many Messianic Believers who, from a Jewish perspective, are convinced that the time of year when Yeshua was really born was at the Succot (the Feast of Tabernacles). Taking into account certain Jewish customs and traditions, and applying them to the biblical birth narrative, it's not difficult to calculate and arrive at this season, known as 'the season of our Joy.'

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Posted by Teamhurldon

I'm agnostic and celebrate christmas because in my fam it was always about, setting a day asside to get together, set differences asside, it was about pretty lights and trees, santa, and hot cocoa-- not the jesus part
so i guess i dont think it its weird.... I love christmas, but I'm not religious...

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I feel the same exact way, im not religious, but i will never give up celebrating christmas, i love all the non religious aspects of it

here is some other info. And talking about dec 25th and pagan practices

a growing number of Christians have been arguing that we should not celebrate Christmas at all because there is no command to do so in the Bible, and the celebration is based in pagan roots

December 25 was also considered to be the birth date of the Iranian mystery god Mithra,, the god of light and contracts. A once-minor god of the Persian pantheon, Roman soldiers adopted Mithra as the manly man's hero, a divinity of fidelity, manliness, and bravery. Women were excluded from the caves where men worshiped Mithra through secret rituals.

While quite different in person and mission, there are a few similarities between the legends of Mithra and the story of Christ. Mithra was said to have been born in a cave, with shepherds attending, (although there were no men on earth at the time (?)). Other legends have him being born from a rock by a river under a tree. According to Persian mythology, Mithra was born of a virgin given the title 'Mother of God'. Mithra was a moral god, upholding the sanctity of the contract even when the contract was made with one who was sure to break it. Initiates into Mithraism would be 'baptized' with the trickle of the sacrificial bull's blood that would flow into a pit. This blood was said to cleanse the initiates from any impurities.

Tertullian (160-220 A.D.), the early Church writer noticed that the pagan religion utilized baptism as well as bread and wine consecrated by priests. He considered Mithraism to have been inspired by the devil, who wanted to mock Christians and lead others to hell.

OMG you all have to read this...i found one thing that says that there is a way to know the EXACT birthdate of jesus and explains how...Wait until you get further down its actually kinda freaky...He says in lukes gospel he says exactly when...i just told FH and he was like OMG that is crazy...its long but if you want go towards the bottom to see the date, second to last paragraph



The world was transfixed by the year 2000--worried about the'Y2K' bug in computers,
millennial madness in cult groups, political union in Europe, and a proposal to make
Mary 'co-redemptrix' in the Catholic Church. While Rome flirted with blasphemy, few
realized that the true 2000th lunar anniversary of the birth of Jesus was August 22, 1998,
or on September 11, 1998 by the solar calendar dating we now use.

Many may live to see the consequences of the anniversary, if it foreshadowed a coming
fake Christ. Or at the least, there were dozens of lunatics eager to take advantage of the
year 2000 hysteria to get the attention of the gullible.

Yet the 2000th anniversary of the Nativity actually came 475 days before year 2000
began. The correct anniversary date was about sundown, Jerusalem time, the end of the
Sabbath, Saturday August 22, 1998.

How can we know the exact day--and nearly the hour--of the birth of Jesus?

Simple arithmatic. A child could have done it, if only the basic assumptions had been
correct. But they weren't. In the 19th century, critical scholars made a crucial decision to
reject a total lunar eclipse in January 1 BC and to accept instead one in March 4 BC, as
the chronological cornerstone for dating the death of Herod the Great, and thereby, the
possible birth years for Jesus.

By so doing, the critics could argue Jesus had to born before 4 BC, contradicting
Luke, who tied Jesus' 30th year to the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar, 27-28 AD. Luke
effectively placed the birth in 3 BC, as did many of the early church fathers. Ironically,
even the date used by the Pope during the Christmas Eve midnight mass ritual is itself
consistent with the last half of 3 BC.

The dirty little secret is that virtually all the available evidence has always pointed
at the harvest period of 3 BC as the focal point of the Nativity--including the possibility
of a late summer birth.

By rejecting Luke, scholars also threw out the date of the birth Luke gives in his
Gospel. In his second chapter, Luke tells what happened the day Mary came to the
Temple for purification 40 days after the birth of Jesus. All one has to know is what
day this was. And Luke plainly names the day. In fact, he includes three statements
identifying the day. So what day was this?

Yom Kippur. The Day of Atonement. The 10th day of the seventh month of the
Hebrew calendar.

In Luke's time, Yom Kippur was called three things: The day of the 'Fast,' the day
of the 'Purification,'and the day of 'Redemption.' Luke uses all three to identify the
day Jesus was brought to the Temple. And he even quotes the Torah rule that mandates
the 40-day period for the mother to wait after the child's birth [Lk 2:22-38].

And if there were any doubt that it was Yom Kippur, Luke tells of a woman named
Anna who had been in the Temple for a 'night and day' without leaving. There was
ONLY ONE DAY A YEAR when a person could pray overnight in the Temple: Yom
Kippur. All other days, the Temple was locked at sundown.

This shows the 40th day of Mary's Purification had begun at the end of Yom Kippur,
the end of the 10th day of the 7th month, because we know the Purification was done at
the earliest opportunity--at the beginning of the 40th day after birth. And since the 6th
month normally had only 29 days, simple arithmatic shows Mary's 39 days of Purification
had to have begun around sundown on the 1st day of the 6th month, called Elul.

This was the night of the first sighting of the new moon of Elul. The Magi in Babylon
were recording this sunset sliver of the new moon on a clay tablet. The cuneiform tablet
the Magi made at that hour 2000 years ago, along with thousands of others from Babylon,
resides in the British Museum. It is possible that this clay tablet was inscribed by one of
the famous Magi who later brought a strange set of gifts to Bethlehem. So the new moon
seen by the Magi in Babylon at the very moment of Jesus being born is recorded on one of
the tablets now in London. Cuneiform scholars have identified the date on this tablet as
equivalent to September, 11, 3 BC.

The Hebrew lunar calendar dates vary with respect to our solar calendar. So the 1st
of Elul was September 11th in 3 BC, but began on August 22 in 1998. The same was true
in the days of the early church, of course. In a given year, the 1st of Elul could have fallen
on September 8th, for example.

This may solve another ancient mystery. No one seems to know how Rome came to
honor September 8th as the birthday of Mary. There is no Biblical, historical, or church
tradition to explain it. It just emerges out of nowhere. Rome keeps the 8th of December as
the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary [ie. conceived without original sin]. It is
a holy day of obligation for all Catholics to attend Mass. This feast is clearly based upon
September 8th also, and mortal sin is attached to the failure of a Catholic to observe it, yet
the origins of these dates are unknown.

On the other hand, we can now see that if Jesus were born on September 11th as Luke
indicates, then Jesus would have been conceived around December 8th in 4 BC. The now
mysterious Mary dates fit Jesus quite well. How might this have happened?

In the late 4th century, in early 380 AD, Pope Damasus I was endeavoring to force all
Christians in the Roman Empire to yield to his authority. He got the Emperor to issue an
edict requiring them to practice the religion of Rome. We know that it is about this time
the Christmas midnight Mass was first celebrated and December 25th first identified as a
Catholic holy day. It is said Damasus was seeking to lure the people away from pagan
rites honoring the birth of the sun god at midnight by compelling Catholic attendance at a
memorial in honor of Christ's death, ie the Mass. The people confused this Mass with the
pagan solar birth rituals conducted at that same time. Gradually, the Christ-Mass became
associated with the Nativity.

Meanwhile, the true feast around September 8th, which naturally honored Mary in
giving birth to Jesus, was converted into a day commemorating her own birth, and an old
holyday honoring the conception of Jesus was converted into a day commemorating the
conception of Mary on December 8th. Strangely, there is still widespread belief among
non-Catholics that this is the day Jesus was concieved--a possible lingering remembrance
of the original meaning of this date.

We can also tell from Luke's Gospel that Jesus had been born in early evening, for
Luke says the shepherds were keeping watch by night, but still had time to go into town
and tell the people what they had seen earlier that evening. People rose early with the sun
in those days, and would have been asleep by 9 or 10 pm. Therefore, the birth had taken
place no later than 8 pm, and probably before 7 pm. Yet Luke says it happened at night,
which means after sunset--surely after 6 pm in September. Hence, it follows that Jesus
was born within a few minutes of 6:30-7:30 pm on the evening of September 11th, 3 BC.

A confirmation of this time is in the book of Revelation. Historian Ernest L. Martin
consulted NASA lunar-phase tables and found the image of the heavens in Revelation 12
showed where the sun and the moon were, relative to Virgo, at the time Jesus was born,
pin-pointing sunset of September 11th of 3 BC. It seems the moon moves so quickly it is
'beneath the feet' of Virgo only a few hours every month. Moreover, the moon comes
within two lunar diameters of Virgo's feet at the time of a new moon but once in 30 years.
The only such occurance any time near the birth of Jesus was on September 11th, 3 BC.

Most previous attempts at determining the birth time were based upon astrology and
dating the Star of Bethlehem. No one considered 3 BC because that year had erroneously
been assumed to follow Herod's death. However, Dr. Martin has proven that Herod did
not die in 4 BC, but in 1 BC. Scholars are now generally accepting the new chronology for
Herod, and this in turn has allowed the confirmation of the New Testament date for the
birth of Jesus. Unfortunately, many churches continue to promote the critics' errors and
paganized traditions about the Nativity.

well, my only point was that stores are closed on xmas because people (most) wouldnt work or shop
yes, there are places open in the city and where denise and i live; but it is not 'THE NORM'

you are right it is not the norm. I personally think that there are certain religious holidays that schools and offices should be closed (Easter, Passover, Yom Kippur, Christmas) the big ones.

I understand why offices and schools do not close for Hannakah just as they don't close for all saints day or other holidays). But if busniess close on Easter why not on passover?

I never understood why the jewish people in my office had to use a vacation day for certain holidays that are big and important.

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Posted by WinterBride08

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Posted by Espo22

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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this is what i was gonna post about...If youre religious then you know that christmas is not the actual birth of jesus, and even many non-religious people do know this so them celebrating christmas can have nothing to do with religion

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I 100% agree with this statement! I tried to skip around that, but that is why I feel christmas doesn't have much (if anything at all) to do with religion....

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I think that should be clarified to state that the majority has distorted Christmas to have nothing to do with religion but the actual holiday ( or holy day ) itself celebrates the birth of Christ, the whole reason ( or half the reason - Easter being the other half ) that all Christians are not Jewish

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Posted by ant n tilde

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Posted by WinterBride08

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Posted by Espo22

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Posted by Future Mulligan

i just read that this girl is obnoxious in her not believing in jesus and she is a jesus/god basher and then celebrates christmas....i can see how that could bother you. that would bother me too...i dont impose my beliefs (or lack of beliefs ) on anybody....and i dont think im right or wrong about what i believe in.....i keep my beliefs to myself and i dont mind that other people believe in other things....i think its great actually - that everyone chooses to believe what they want.....i dont like when people badmouth other peoples beliefs....who cares what other people believe? if you dont like it than you dont have to believe in it!


Oh and I wanted to ask a question abot Christmas and the birth of Jesus.....was Jesus actually supposed to born on December 25? I thought that the date was made up? and if its made up - than that is pretty stupid to me JMO

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this is what i was gonna post about...If youre religious then you know that christmas is not the actual birth of jesus, and even many non-religious people do know this so them celebrating christmas can have nothing to do with religion

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I 100% agree with this statement! I tried to skip around that, but that is why I feel christmas doesn't have much (if anything at all) to do with religion....

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I think that should be clarified to state that the majority has distorted Christmas to have nothing to do with religion but the actual holiday ( or holy day ) itself celebrates the birth of Christ, the whole reason ( or half the reason - Easter being the other half ) that all Christians are not Jewish

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in agreeemnt tilde, Christmas day, although not the actual day is the day that is recognized by the Christian community, nothing abnormal about this, we don't celebrate presidents day on any presidents actual birthday, and MLK day isn't on the actualy day he was born either.. it's the recognition of the day that counts..

i don't really understand how come 'non religious' people celebrate a religious holiday.. u can say u'r not religious but u get togehter with family and blah blah blah but why do it on the 25th of december? why not do it on the 12th of march?

anyhoo.. most schools although not closed on hanukkah (which is most likely due to the fact that hanukkah is a 7 day holiday not one) are closed on most other major jewish holidays.. even in districts where students are not jewish schools are closed on yom kippur, rosh hashannah and spring break revolves around passover, not easter.

I didnt read all the threads, but maybe she celebrates b/c her family does.

I celebrate b/c of the true meaning but I also see christmas as a time to spend time w/ the family and carry on traditions.