Atheism: The Ultimate Guide (COMPLETED)

29. The True Origins of Christmas

For starters, the celebration during the wintertime is not a new idea. Many cultures have celebrated during the wintertime years before Jesus ever came around. 

Early Europeans celebrated during the winter solstice as a celebration of light, birth, and the end of winter and the beginning of sunshine and prosperity. The Norse in Scandinavia celebrated Yule from the winter solstice through January. In fact, the end of December was an extremely popular time to celebrate for Europeans. The Germans honored the pagan god Odin during the mid-winter holiday. 

Saturnalia (in honor of the god Saturn) was celebrated by the Romans and went on for an entire month. They also celebrated Juvenalia, a celebration for the children of Rome. Members of the Roman upper-class often celebrated the birth of Mithra (god of the unconquerable sun) on December 25th. 

In the beginning years of Christianity, Easter was the main holiday. The birth of Jesus was unknown and not celebrated. In the fourth century, church officials decided to institute the birth of Jesus as an official holiday. The problem was, the Bible never specified when Jesus was actually born.

Some evidence suggests Jesus was actually born in the springtime, but church officials decided to choose a random day to be Jesus' birthday. Pope Julius I chose December 25th, but not randomly. It's known that the church chose this day to absorb pagan traditions such as Saturnalia and to indoctrinate more people into Christianity. 

The new custom spread to Europe around 432 AD and to England by the end of the 6th century. By the end of the 8th century, "Christmas" had spread all the way to Scandinavia. 

Unfortunately, by the time of the Middle Ages, Christianity had basically replaced pagan religion. 

Christmas was officially declared a federal holiday in 1870. 

There you have it! The true origins of Christmas! I'm excluding all the stuff about Santa Claus, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, etc.