Do Christians have major holidays in the year?

Question

There are many holidays that "christians" observe. However in order to find out if they should be observed or celebrated we need to compare their origin and what they stand for, against the Bibles counsel for us as "christians."

First off the Bible clearly states, (all translations), at 1 Corinthians 6:14-18 to

to "quit touching the unclean thing", have no stay clear of all things that originate with the "lawless", which includes idol and false gods.

Some may be lost here and wonder what this has to do with holidays. Understandable. So lets look at ta few holidays and there origins.

Christmas

Josef Cardinal Tomko, prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of

Peoples, noted: “The missionary Church practiced the work of inculturation long before the term began to be used.” The Christmas celebration illustrates the matter well, as La Repubblica noted. Originally it was a pagan celebration. “The date of December 25 does not correspond to Christ’s birth,” acknowledges the New Catholic Encyclopedia, “but to the feast of the Natalis Solis Invicti, the Roman sun festival at the solstice.”

JUST three days before Christmas 1993, Pope John Paul II acknowledged that the celebration of Christmas is not rooted in the Bible. Regarding the date December 25, the pope admitted: “On that day in pagan antiquity, the birthday of the ‘Invincible Sun’ was celebrated to coincide with the winter solstice.” How, then, did Christmas begin? The pope continued: “It seemed logical and natural to Christians to replace that feast with the celebration of the only and true Sun, Jesus Christ.”

The Christmas tree “has precious little to do with Christian celebration and a lot to do with the stubborn survival through the millennia of pagan rituals of winter light and rebirth.” (The Boston Herald) “Trees with trinkets hanging on them were part of the pagan festivals for centuries.”—Church Christmas Tab.

Holly was popular with the Celts “to keep the house goblins in order at winter solstice time. . . . It could deflect evil, help in the divination of dreams, defend a house from lightning.”— Beautiful British Columbia.

Mistletoe “came from the Druids in England who used it in strange worship relating to demonic and occult powers.”— Church Christmas Tab.

Gift giving was a feature of Saturnalia. “You were expected at this festival to make some present to all your friends.”— Ancient Italy and Modern Religion.

The star “atop the tree was worshiped in the East as a symbol of purity, goodness and peace 5,000 years before the nativity of Christ.”— United Church Herald.

The candle “does not come . . . from the Christian sanctuary. We took it from a much earlier altar, the Druid oak.”— United Church Herald.

Santa was stolen “from ancient German mythology: ‘Thor was an elderly man, jovial and friendly, of heavy build with a long white beard. He drove a chariot and was said to live in the Northland . . . His element was fire, his color red. The fireplace in every home was sacred to him, and he was said to come down into it through the chimney.”— United Church Herald.

Easter

Easter was “originally the spring festival in honor of the Teutonic goddess of light and spring known in Anglo-Saxon as Easter.” -The Westminster Dictionary of the Bible

The rabbit “was the pet of the Germanic goddess Ostara.”— Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend.

The Easter bonnet originally “was a wreath of flowers or leaves. The circle or crown expressed the round sun and its course in the heavens which brought the return of spring.” The new Easter outfit developed because “it was considered discourteous and therefore bad luck to greet the Scandinavian goddess of Spring, or Easter, in anything but fresh garb, since the goddess was bestowing one on the earth.”— The Giant Book of Superstitions.

Hot cross buns: “Like the Greeks, the Romans ate bread marked with a cross . . . at public sacrifices.” They were eaten by pagan Saxons in honor of Easter.— Encyclopedia Britannica.

Sunrise services parallel rites “performed at the vernal equinox welcoming the sun and its great power to bring new life to all growing things.”— Celebrations.

The Catholic Encyclopedia tells us: “A great many pagan customs, celebrating the return of spring, gravitated to Easter. The egg is the emblem of the germinating life of early spring. . . . The rabbit is a pagan symbol and has always been an emblem of fertility.”—(1913), Vol. V, p. 227.

Many holidays are steeply based in pagan origin and customs. If we are to please God and stay clear of idolatry, false worship and practices He condones, then we need to stay away from such holidays and traditions that displease Him.

Christopher Coyle · Accepted Answer