Co-Opted Christmas

Each December many a believer enters the Holiday Wars with more energy than it takes to power Clark Griswold’s Christmas lights. “Keep Christ in Christmas” is the battle cry. But Jesus really isn’t the reason for the season. For Christmas, as we celebrate it today, is a rather modern invention.

For the first few centuries of Christian history there was no Christmas at all. Christians celebrating the birth of an alternative King with Caesar still very much in Roman power, was a recipe for extermination. So, early believers co-opted a pagan festival for their celebratory use, a holiday when the Romans and a host of other barbarian nations celebrated the birthday of the Unconquerable Sun.

This festival was just days after December’s winter solstice, with the masses rejoicing that the sun once again would not die, but would continue to shine. They decorated their homes with evergreens and pines (vegetation…