Some Christians Hated Christmas


It's ironic Bill O'Reilly made such a stink about saying "Happy Holidays." There have been and remain Christians who found the Christmas celebration not Christian.

The Puritans, sometimes considered the founders of this country, had no use for it. And, they had good reason.

Nowhere among the voluminous quotes attributed to Jesus did he ever direct followers to celebrate his birthday. In addition, there is plenty of evidence he would not have been born in December. On top of that, the Puritans noted, the entire holiday stinks like Paganism. It was the Pagans who celebrated the Winter solstice, not Christians.

One Christian faith, Jehovah's Witnesses, does not celebrate Christmas for most of the same reasons.

The historical record shows the distaste of Christmas to the Puritans whose home continent,  Europe, celebrated it. In 1659 the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony issued a ruling against any Christmas celebration because it was a superstition in other countries and was "to the great dishonor of God." This law existed for several decades.

This bit of history makes "The War on Christmas" over. Probably the Puritans would not have liked either "Happy Holidays" or "Merry Christmas."

This year remember that any holiday greeting would have offended our earliest Christians.

Comments

  1. tsmDecember 3, 2018 at 3:55 PM

    Nothing new here. The Puritans most certainly did not like Christmas, thinking of it as a papist/pagan celebration. Wanted it out of the Anglican liturgical calendar as well. Ironically their neo-pagan descendants can now celebrate Christmas with the best of them. In any event, what's wrong with a Christianized pagan holiday? We know that Christ was probably not born in December. We do, however, live in the Northern Hemisphere where Decembers get awfully gloomy and dark and where we need a lift with bright lights and brightened spirits. The pagans, after all, had something good going for them. So why not keep the tradition going? BTW, the Puritans were real killjoys, kinda like the old Grinch.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Jon LindgrenDecember 3, 2018 at 4:02 PM

    "In any event what's wrong with a Christianized pagan holiday?"
    Nothing. Nothing is wrong either with the greeting of "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas." Bill O'Reilly and a host of other pundits complained bitterly about "Happy Holidays." The point of my blog is that both greetings reflect branches of Christianity.

    ReplyDelete
  3. tsmDecember 3, 2018 at 7:27 PM

    understood. BTW Happy Holydays to you.

    ReplyDelete

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