Christs - Mass

Now the moment I have been looking forward to, ripping what we call "a happy holiday" to shreds (well for the Christians reading it will be)

So Christmas which we recognise as a Christian holiday is still the one day that stops the earth still, as far as I'm aware the only people still on the job will be the cops, ambulances and fire fighters. which may as well be my first point, isn't it funny that even though the remembrance of Jesus can still stop the world that we still need humans to control our society, on the one day when its actually suppose to be about family and Jesus we still fail to 'be good'

Now as for Christ being the 'reason for the season', The origins of Christmas are described as follows on Wikipedia

"Christmas Day or Christmastide, is an annual holiday celebrated on December 25 that marks and honours the birth of Jesus of Nazareth. The birth of Jesus, which is the basis for the anno Domini system of dating, is thought to have occurred between 7 and 2 BC. December 25 is not thought to be Jesus' actual date of birth, and the date may have been chosen to correspond with the Roman Festival."

I'm sure the majority of us are aware of the falsehood of the 25th being Jesus actual date, I personally have found two dates given by leading scholars is August 14th and July 17th. Now the simple fact is that we will never TRULY know the date of his birth but I'm also sure very few of us knew that our Christ mass was ripped off from a pagan celebration. This Roman festival in December was called Saturnalia, this was the feast that celebrated the mythological God "Saturn" this was originally on the 17th and eventually expanded to a whole week lasting until the 23rd. One form of celebration was a school holiday and the making and giving of small presents. This resembles closely the sole focus of our Christmas celebration today. For Saturnalia The customary greeting for the occasion is a "Io, Saturnalia!" — Io (pronounced "yo") being a Latin interjection related to "ho" (as in "Ho, praise to Saturn"). now I'm sure you are all thinking of the correlation between Santa and his jolly "ho ho ho" being a direct symbol of the pagan worship and celebration that still exists today.

Now for this next paragraph I will probably recieve a bit of "you're such a conspiricist" because it does sound crazy and in all reality when I first had this revelation I was taken aback. But here goes, Santa is a direct anagram for someone that is commonly known in Christianity and in the Bible. If you didn't catch that its Satan. feel free to call me crazy, I simply couldn't care but let me give a reasonable explanation to this. Christmas has indeed become materialised, I see too many Christians get lost in this materialism and I can't help but shake my head in disgrace. People sometimes even expect gifts and if they are not given to them they feel disappointed and even disrespected. Today its all about what we can get. Its all purely Greed. in 2006 I went all out for Christmas and I did it not in hope of what I got in return but in the pure joy that I receive when I give without strings attached.
this year I have done cards and a small knick nack from Trade aid. which leads me to another small yet significant thing, think for a moment where you bought most of your presents this year, and then ask yourself this "what chance is there that that shop bought from china or India?" why would you ask that? because a significant number of Chinese manufacturers are in the business of slave labour. I'm sure I need not elaborate on that idea but my point is this, whilst you buy your gifts and give them and recieve them at the same time kids in slave labour are getting paid less that 1US dollar a day and usually and extra 20 cents if they sleep over night at the factory.

now I must move on to the point of Christmas trees, don't get me wrong I love pine trees and some of my fond memories are of the smell of pine on Christmas morning in the living room. However n ancient times the winter solstice was celebrated in Babylon as the birth day of Tammuz, the god of vegetation. According to the pagans, the god Nimrod would visit the evergreen tree and leave gifts upon it. This festival became known as the Saturnalia, and friends and family would exchange gifts. Jeremiah 10 verses 2-4 states

2 This is what the LORD says:
"Do not learn the ways of the nations
or be terrified by signs in the sky,
though the nations are terrified by them.

3 For the customs of the peoples are worthless;
they cut a tree out of the forest,
and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.

4 They adorn it with silver and gold;
they fasten it with hammer and nails
so it will not totter.

so what can we take from this? the decoration of trees is tradition of Saturnalia which is a pagan festival and is detestable by God. ok so can we have Christmas without trees? of course you can, but what of the exchanging of gifts that is also part of that pagan celebration. Ok so no gifts either. so what's left? well a day off work and the word Christmas. so my simple obligation is this, why do we not celebrate it in this way? a day off and the focus on Christ mass. despite the rip off of Saturnalia's dates we SHOULD be able to focus on Christ. Another question I would have to pose is why oh why do we need a specified date to remember Jesus? the ideal would be for us to remember him everyday and I do pray that for us all. But I simply ask this of you this Christmas. Who are you doing it for? for yourself to get gifts? for others to serve and show them you care? or for Jesus?

so Who are you buying the gifts for? who are you decorating that tree for? who are you singing the carols to? what are you thinking when you recieve your gifts? think about it.

Seriously.