Of course it’s not necessary that it fall on the same day in for there to be an association. Christmas doesn’t coincide exactly with the Saturnalia, but there’s little doubt that it’s celebrated at that general time of year (and nowhere near the probable date of birth of Christ, which was most likely in the spring) in order to be close to the Winter Solstice.
Not sure exactly what you’re point is here. You seem to be acknowledging that Christian festivals actually have pagan roots.
I would consider it to be non-Christian or pre-Christian traditions. Surely this isn’t that difficult to understand.
It seems to me that if you go looking to find links between festivals and symbols you can no doubt find them. You might as well be quoting the Da Vinci Code though…
Do I? Is it so difficult to understand that if I have Christmas decorations up on my sister’s birthday, it doesn’t mean I’m not really celebrating her birthday? Or that her birthday has “Christmas roots”?
Oh, OK. It is for me. The idea that Celtic customs get grouped in with Roman customs because they’re both “not Christian” seems really stupid to me. Ach sinn mar a tha e! Are Internet memes Pagan too?
No. If you wish to claim specific linkages, then do so. I’m not going to run about trying to demonstrate that more than one group of people can learn to draw a cross at some point in their history. Or that if I use it as a plus sign, I’m somehow secretly worshipping the ancient alien gods.
Your evaluation of my ignorance isn’t really relevant to…well, anything.
Kids eat chocolate eggs because the color of the chocolate and the color of the wood on the cross… Well, you tell me. It’s got nothing to do with it, has it?
People are going, “Remember kids, Jesus died for your sins.”
“Yeah, I know, it’s great.”
“No, it’s bad.”
“It’s bad. It’s terrible. Whatever you want. Just keep giving me these eggs.”
And the bunny rabbits, where do they come into the Crucifixion?
There were no rabbits going, “You putting crosses in our warrens? We live below this hill, all right?”
Bunny rabbits are for shagging, eggs are for fertility. It’s the spring festival.
Well, those vegetables were already sacrificed before they got canned. I don’t know what prayers were said and I haven’t checked the labels on the cans, but I’m pretty sure they are likely to be kosher.
I have never met anyone who treated midsummer as a time of worship rather than just an excuse to party and make a big fire. To all my friends and relatives in Norway it’s very much empty rituals.
Well it’s not in the least pagan, but over in the UK, ever November 5th, we have a big bonfire, loads of ridiculously expensive fireworks and burn poor old Guy Fawkes in effigy.
Guido Fawkes had the quite laudable idea of blowing all the politicians in the houses of parliament to kingdom come - he almost succeeded too. The fact that he was a Catholic in a (officially) Protestant country meant that he was vilified as a Papist pawn and was sentenced to the traditional traitors’ death - to be ‘hanged, drawn and quartered’. In the event, he jumped from the gallows, breaking his own neck and thereby avoiding the horror of being cut down while still alive, having his testicles cut off and his stomach opened and his guts spilled before his eyes. His lifeless body was hacked into quarters and his remains sent to “the four corners of the kingdom” as a warning to others.
By Rune’s ‘not empty, bordering on worship’-definition, I’d call it empty, but if you want to define fun as ‘not empty’ a weekend binge is a pagan tradition.
The tradition of setting up bonfires on Saint John’s day is widespread all over Europe, with variations about the kind of fire, what is done around it, etc…
Where I was brought up, it was a whole (small) tree that was cut down and put on fire, rather than any random bonfire, and young people would jump over the fire as soon as it appeared possible. I remember that my grandmother would also pick up a bit of the resulting charcoal and draw a cross on the doorstep with it.
Halloween is based on Samhain.
May Day is based on Beltane. There might not be a maypole in everyone’s yard but some people still do it.
People burn Yule Logs at Christmastime.
