Equal Protection for all Religion?

Zenchi wrote: Takes place coincidentally with other holidays.... no. Lets be clear, the leaders of this faith stole traditions from just about any faith viewed as a threat, then they placed their holy days right on top of others in vain attempts to stomp their faiths out of existence. Just about every tradition AND belief in Christianity is "borrowed" from paganism or some other faith.

Not exactly. To see this as a malicious conspiratorial decision rather than an organic process of introducing (and in some cases, forcing) a new faith onto a foreign people is to be ignorant of the history of all the faiths involved. One must remember that Christianity proper was actually taken up from the messianic Jews who dealt with Christ primarily by Hellenic and Germanic peoples. And, most of the things about Christmas that were "stolen" (and Easter, for that matter) are from Germanic pagan cultures--the same cultures who embraced (willingly or not) Christianity the most in the Occidental world. To imply there was a board meeting of a few bishops who decided that watering down their message was the surest way to conquer the lands--that's not a Christian ideal, that's a political concept. I think you're giving early Christendom too much Illuminati-level credit.

steamboat28 wrote:

ghost dog wrote: If people cared about Truth most christians would not think that christmas is a christian holiday.

Okay, look:

"Christmas" comes from the original title "Christ's Mass", which is a mass (service/ceremony) in which Christ is celebrated. The focus for Christmas has always been the nativity, due to the nature of the narrative of the religion, so the birth of Christ has always been central to the holiday.

Do we (Christians) really believe Christ was born on Dec 25? No. We don't. We know He wasn't because a) his historicity is still in the air, and b) if it weren't, contextual cues put the time of his birth closer to the general time period of the celebration of the Jewish new year on the first of Tishrei (which usually falls in September in more Western calendars). Not that any of that matters any more than deciding to hold your birthday celebration on Saturday when your birthday is on Tuesday because people have work schedules.

So, why is Christmas celebrated in December? Partly because of Saturnalia, partly because of Yule, partly because Christianity was lacking a winter solstice holiday. We stole bits and pieces of both of the previously mentioned celebrations partly to Christianize those peoples and partly because those peoples became Christian.

Stop saying Christmas isn't a Christian holiday. It very clearly is, since we rather kind of invented it. It just happens to take place coincidentally with other holidays which it shares similarities to because of syncretism of local faith.

i erased my sarcasm, because at a base level it is nothing more than a glorified lie. maybe we need to have a Bible study on "Christ Mass", or maybe just watch the truth or tradition video.

steamboat28 wrote:

Zenchi wrote: Takes place coincidentally with other holidays.... no. Lets be clear, the leaders of this faith stole traditions from just about any faith viewed as a threat, then they placed their holy days right on top of others in vain attempts to stomp their faiths out of existence. Just about every tradition AND belief in Christianity is "borrowed" from paganism or some other faith.

To imply there was a board meeting of a few bishops who decided that watering down their message was the surest way to conquer the lands--that's not a ChI think you're giving early Christendom too much Illuminati-level credit.

Board meeting, probably not so much, Illuminati, not really. They knew what they were doing however. There's even debate that Jesus never existed, was originally Osiris, etc etc. Not that I believe all of it. Traditions and beliefs from the pagans didn't just coincidentally and conveniently fall in the Christian laps, they were taken, or "adopted" and then they waged war on them after having done so...

The Romans were pagans, and they did have several such board meetings. The Council of Laodicea and Nicea.

It wasn't pagans that were being persecuted it was True "Christians" that were being persecuted.

i believe early(True Christians) have more in common with pagans that most would suppose, but don't know for sure. They kind of killed and tortured them all to hide the truth.

what we have left today is the equivalent of someone gorging themselves on veinna sausages, cheap cold cuts from walmart, and other rotting carrion and taking a big dump on a dinner table, feeding it to the masses and saying dig in. ....oh, yes, and claiming that what they ate was a strictly vegan meal, so what they fed to the masses was just properly digested vegetable matter.

steamboat28 wrote:

Zenchi wrote: Takes place coincidentally with other holidays.... no. Lets be clear, the leaders of this faith stole traditions from just about any faith viewed as a threat, then they placed their holy days right on top of others in vain attempts to stomp their faiths out of existence. Just about every tradition AND belief in Christianity is "borrowed" from paganism or some other faith.

Not exactly. To see this as a malicious conspiratorial decision rather than an organic process of introducing (and in some cases, forcing) a new faith onto a foreign people is to be ignorant of the history of all the faiths involved. One must remember that Christianity proper was actually taken up from the messianic Jews who dealt with Christ primarily by Hellenic and Germanic peoples. And, most of the things about Christmas that were "stolen" (and Easter, for that matter) are from Germanic pagan cultures--the same cultures who embraced (willingly or not) Christianity the most in the Occidental world. To imply there was a board meeting of a few bishops who decided that watering down their message was the surest way to conquer the lands--that's not a Christian ideal, that's a political concept. I think you're giving early Christendom too much Illuminati-level credit.

I think you underestimate the complexity of politics back then. We're talking about rome and francia, not exactly petty powers. This is particularly relevant in the case of franks, who had a christianity-based monarchy starting from clovis.

I already went on a rant about this in my journal earlier this week, so I'll paraphrase...

Certain cosmic events associated with the changing of the seasons have been recognized by human beings since the dawn of time. Partly out of ceremony and partly because recognizing these signs of a changing season was crucial to survival.

Many religions adopted these events as holidays. Some did so to celebrate their God or gods for bringing about the changes once again. Others did it deliberately to assimilate older traditions into a new religious tradition.

Regardless, anybody can choose to celebrate these holidays however they want. If you think "Christ Mass" stole your Winter Solstice or Saturnalia thunder, then ignore Christmas and go about your business being pagan. Jews have celebrated Passover despite the arrival of Easter. It's not that big of a deal unless you make it one.

This thread is about "Equal Protection" for all religion. This doesn't imply exclusive ownership of a holiday, date, or celebration. In my world it should ideally be "practice what you want, celebrate what you choose, and allow me to do the same."