How CVMS Students Celebrate the Holiday Season
The holiday season is more than its definition. It means a lot more to some people.
Christmas
Christmas is celebrated to remember the birth of Jesus Christ, who Christians believe is the Son of God. But was Jesus really born on December 25 in the first place? Probably not. The Bible doesn’t mention his exact birthday, and the nativity story has clues. When church officials settled on December 25 at the end of the third century, they likely wanted the date to match with existing festivals honoring Saturn (the Roman god of agriculture) and Mithra (the Persian god of light). That way, it became easier to convince Rome’s subjects to accept Christianity as the empire’s religion.
Where do Christmas traditions originate?
It is true to say that the western Christmas began as a Christianized feast. The Christmas tree is also a symbol of fertility.
In northern countries, when the nights are long and cold, the feast of Christmas traditionally gave Christian people something to look forward to: rich food (reindeer if you are in Sweden, pork, and lamb if you are in Greece), lots of candles, Catholic Mass at midnight or services on Christmas morning. Fir trees were brought inside and lit with candles as a symbol of the hope that spring would return with new crops and plentiful food.
Here are some students we interviewed:
Diana Zewdie (7): I celebrate New Year and Christmas but I think Christmas is better because it is in the winter, we get presents and get to be with our family.
Atlee Olofson (8): I celebrate Christmas and New Year but I think Christmas is better because it’s Jesus’s birthday and we get to spend time with our family. The best present I got for Christmas was a ski trip!
Cate Defendorf (8): I celebrate Christmas and New Year but I think New Year is better because I get to go to the lake with my friends and party all night!
Claire DeLane (8): I celebrate Christmas and New Year but I think Christmas is better because we get to spend time with our family. The best Christmas present I’ve ever got is a trip to Las Vegas.
Hanukkah
Elena Weinstein (8): I celebrate Hanukkah and I like that my whole family can get together, light the candles, and open presents after. We don’t usually go anywhere.
Mehak Mehmi is a kind, friendly, and funny seventh grader. She likes playing volleyball but did not get on the team this year because of life. She is a...
Lyla Boretz • Dec 14, 2018 at 9:05 am
while western christmas WAS christianized, it originally stemmed from paganism