For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let’s celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. ~1 Corinthians 5:7-8
Christmas has been a Christian feast from the mid-fourth century to the present day. It’s significance in the lives of Christ followers have wained and surged throughout church history. Many have sought to do away with Christmas, while others have embraced it. The December 25th date that had previously been a pagan festival date was adopted by christians. Christmas was not the first feast celebrated by early Christians. The feast of Epiphany celebrated the coming of the Magi to see Christ. The feast of Epiphany was celebrated long before Christmas but has little notice in the church today. There are a number of feasts in the church calendar today: Lent, Easter, Thanksgiving, Advent and Christmas to name a few. Why have certain feasts gained in popularity while other feasts wained. I believe that culture has a large influence on the feasts.
Is Christmas a church feast or is it a cultural feast?
In my local church we celebrate advent. Advent looks back to Christ’s first coming and looks ahead to his second coming. Passages about Jesus birth are read each Sunday morning in the month of December. I do not know why only passages about has first coming are read, while passages foretelling his second coming are not read, nonetheless, the focus is on the coming of Christ.
Many Christians celebrate Christmas but is Christmas pagan or christian? I am not asking in terms of the paganism that existed in the culture at the time of the early church but the paganism of the post-modern-humanistic world of today. I think that Advent is a church celebration of the coming of Christ, while Christmas is a cultural celebration of family and abundance.
I had always considered my family small until the family that I had was taken away.
I have come to this understanding because what I unconsciously celebrated at Christmas has been taken away. The church does not increase its activities during Christmas but shrinks in it’s activities. If Christmas is a church feast, why do church activities decrease during Christmas? In my local church, Sunday morning bible studies have been suspended for the Sunday mornings of December 26th and January 2nd, also, our Wednesday night dinners are suspended for three weeks. If Christmas is a church feast, why the decrease in church activities? Church activities are decreased during the Christmas season so that people can spend time with their families. Given that my family has had major changes, it is apparent to me that Christmas is a cultural celebration of family and abundance.
