I wasn’t sure if this should go in GD or IMHO or where. If a mod feels this should be elsewhere feel free to move it.
I was just curious if people here think it is hypocritical to celebrate christmas (I suppose easter as well) but not believe in god? I do celebrate it with my family. I really enjoy the ideas of giving and whatnot, but I don’t necessarily believe in all the reasons why we celebrate it. I would kinda feel like the grinch if I didn’t.
Also do you celebrate it?
But I don’t care.
I like to give my family and friends presents. And I like to get presents. And it’s a good excuse to visit relatives.
Yes, possibly it’s hypocritical to celebrate Christmas even though I’m an agnostic. But what the hell, avoiding a certain social holiday just because the Christian church claims it seems to be giving in to the church in a different way.
I mean, originally Christmas was a replacement holiday picked by the church to over-ride the Roman holiday of Saturnalia, aka the festival of their god Saturn. Which was itself was an attempt by the Romans to convert those heathen pagans who celebrated the winter solstice as a holiday by having a feast.
So screw it. I’m going to keep giving presents and spending time with my family on December 25th. Let everyone else blabber on about Jesus if they want. I don’t care.
-Ben
MikeRochenelle that’s pretty much that attitude I have had this whole time. I think it’s a great social event plus nothing can replace the look on the little kid’s faces when they open up the presents. I have always just kinda felt guilty though for enjoying it even though I couldn’t care less about all the “church hoopla” surrounding it.
I think Christmas has expanded beyond a strictly religious holiday. Certainly the religious basis of it is very important to those who practice christianity but the aspects of the celebration have been adopted much more widely.
Jews in the US generally substitute Hanukkah in place of Christmas. From my jewish friends I have it that Hanukkah is actually a relatively minor religious observance in the Jewish religion yet American Jews have elevated it somewhat so they can have their version of gift giving roughly around the same time. I even know one jewish family that gets a christmas tree and does Christmas like most christians. The kids enjoy Santa Claus and Frosty the Snowman and all of the ancillary stuff surrounding Christmas. The kids just don’t get the religious dogma with it.
Conversely I have an Aunt (or rather Aunt-in-Law) who has become a real bible thumping holy roller. She prohibits her children from anything Christmas like except the stuff directly relating to the religious purpose of Christmas…Santa Claus is nowhere to be found in their house.
On the whole I think it is fine to adopt Christmas as a day for family and gift giving even if you don’t buy the religious aspects.
Besides…where would American merchants be without it? 
It’s no more hypocritical for an atheist to celebrate Christmas than it is for a Christian not to celebrate Christmas. (there are a couple of Christian religions that don’t celebrate it).
One thing to keep in mind is, many of the Christmas traditions were not originated in religion to begin with.
I’m an atheist.
I celebrate Christmas.
Why not? It’s a fun social event, and it’s my way of paying tribute to the Winter Solstice, just as the ancient pagans did.
Now, note that there aren’t any crosses in my house, and no nativity scenes under the tree, and no trumpeting angels on top of the tree. Just a nice pagan tree, and nice non-denominational decorations, and nice non-religious holiday cards.
To do otherwise, that would be hypocritical.
I don’t celebrate Christmas, I celebrate Annual Secular Gift Giving and Social Gathering Day, which just HAPPENS to fall on December 25th. 
Same.
I don’t celebrate Christmas, just the Winter Festival.
There’s some connection claimed between 25th December and the Christian God ? That’s interesting. That day, I have family around for dinner and we celebrate the festival of Sol Invictus
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/Mithraism.html
not because we believe in that Mithras nonsense, but as a traditional way of acknowledging the turn of the year and the passage of Winter.
William, I suspect that we have similar attitudes about these things. I will celebrate any day if a reason presents itself – you know, like waking up or the cat is yawning or the phone rings. 
I don’t think anyone is being a hypocrite to celebrate as much as possible.
I disagree. I set up a nativity scene on the mantel every Christmas for the same reason that I decorate my place with ghosts and vampires every Halloween, and I certainly don’t believe in them. I don’t dislike Jesus, nor am I opposed to His teachings (although some of his followers are nuisances). Just because I don’t accpet His divinity does not make me a hypocrite.
I have statues of Hindu gods as well as Buddhists saints in my aprtment, souvenirs of my sojourn in Asia. Does my lack of belief in Hinduism make me a hypocrite for having a statue of Ganesh on my computer?
The way I look at it, most people who celebrate Christmas (at least in the United States) are participating in a certain amount of cheerful hypocrisy, regardless of their religious convictions. After all, few adults actually believe in Santa Claus or flying reindeer, yet they willingly decorate their houses with those images, tell elaborate stories and even dress up like Santa to keep the kids entertained. So I feel perfectly justified in setting up the family’s nativity scene and impaling the angel on top of the tree, even though I may not believe in the literal divinity of Jesus or what have you. I also celebrate Halloween, even though I don’t have any faith in whatever mishmosh of goofy religious traditions gave rise to it (Feast of St. Willy Wonka? Festival of the Great Pumpkin? Dracula’s birthday?). The only difference is, there are no surviving practitioners of fundamentalist Halloweenism to make you feel guilty if you don’t actually believe that the true purpose of the holiday is to sacrifice a pumpkin to keep evil spirits in their graves.
Not at all. If you don’t believe in God or that Jesus was God, or the son of God or whatever, you still can believe that his teachings regarding love are a good thing.
As an American, an agnostic and a slacker, I’ll celebrate “Howard Stern’s Big Hairy Ass Day” if it gets me out of work.
Nope, I look at it as a time to get together with friends and family. I do not put up any decorations and try to keep gift buying to a minimum. For me it is purely secular, and when I hear people whine about the secularization of Xmas, I say bring it on. Make it even more secular. Let the religious have their day, but also let those of use who do not believe have ours as well.
We celebrate the arrival of the winter solstice with gifts, as well as an Xmas tree full of secular and quasi-secular ornaments (decorative fruits, King Kong atop the Empire State Building, GWB being eaten by crocodiles etc.).
Our holiday is cheerfully and tackily commercial. Those who want to cop a superior attitude by adhering to The Real Jesus Christmas or Kwanzaa or suchlike may do so.
We’ll be the ones cackling in the corner, eating the last of our Xmas goodies and burping.
No, you can still celebrate “X-mas” and be an atheist.
As a life long denier, I find christmas sacreligious enough to ignore any supposed religious implications.
Besides, if current thought is to be believed, isn’t “Christmas” really based on the Saturnal (sic) roman holiday rather than anything christian?
I can’t believe that so many people thought it was ok. I figured at least one “holy roller” would come in here and damn us all to hell. Thanks guys!
FYI, there are quite a few Christians opposed to celebrating Christmas amongst themselves because of the pagan origins. JW’s don’t even celebrate their own birthdays foir some scriptural reason that I’m unaware of.
grienspace, I asked a JW about the whole birthday thing and she explained “Every day is a gift.” I could barely contain myself, having just seen The Kids in the Hall Movie Brain Candy (in which Cancer Boy, played by Bruce McCulloch, uses that same line).
I think I’ve mentioned this before, but when one of my cousin’s asked what Xmas celebrates, he answered “The death of Santa.” So I celebrate “Santa Day,” complete with a creche made entirely of Santa figurines (e.g. a tiny Santa candle lying in a manger, a dangling Santa-angel).