Kaytee

Since we have a lot of athiests here I thought I would ask.

Is it right for non believers to participate in religious holidays? Christmas is about the birth of Jesus (and to me celebrating one of our saints as well, but that is a different debate). Easter is about the death of Jesus and His ressurection. (of course some could debate that this is also a wiccan holiday...)

so what does everyone think?

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sadinplaid

Raised by parents who believe in God but not in organized religion, we grew up participating in these religious holidays, but my parents never focused on the religious aspect of the holidays - at Christmas, we opened presents; at Easter we hunted eggs. I am now an atheist, but still enjoy the family-aspect of these holidays. We treat these holidays like Thanksgiving - a good reason to decorate, get together, and have a great time.

jenilouise

My dad is an athiest and we always participated in the holidays.

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Tau

There are religious observations, and there are holiday traditions. The two are not the same thing.

Yule trees, rabbits, chimneys, eggs, and so on are not part of the birth or resurrection of Jesus. They have been adopted into our distinctly American traditions, though.

Other countries have their own cultural traditions that coincide with the same religious observations - making the only common thread between the two, the religion, not the tradition.

(both Easter and Christmas celebrations have borrowed heavily from Pagan traditions, but they really cannot be reasonably argued to be the same thing.)

Kaytee

I agree Tau. Its sad but true.

__________________

If you can't stand behind our troops, feel free to stand in front of them!
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Teresa

To me, the holidays are what you make them. If you want to celebrate them as religious days, that's what they are to YOU. If you want to celebrate them just for fun and presents, that's what they are to YOU. It's all about where you put your focus.

__________________

Wife to Barry
Mother to Brian,Adrienne and Amy
Christianity is not a religion like most people think. Christianity is a life of imitating Jesus.

evilbrent

frankly, seeing as more than half of the Traditions surrounding Christmas have nothing to do with chrisitianity (The tree: pagan rite of bringing the 'forest' into your home, misteltoe: roman symbol is sexual licentiousness, red-jolly santa claus: image brought to you by coca cola, the date: annual festival taken over by romans christianizing local population, the presents: modern hyper-consumerism dressed up as generosity, the feast: part of the pre-existing feast date stolen by the romans.)

Historically, just about the only things christians have brought to Christmas have been the name, a randomly garbled story (have you ever actually READ the three different stories??) of how Jesus was born, and widespread public humiliation and brutalisation of Jews (although this part of Christmas appears to have dropped out of the modern celebration.)

I honestly don't understand what the question is about.

Christmas has nothing to do with christianity.

evilbrent

What's sad about it?

Kaytee

That so many of the "American traditions" have been borrowed. Also that the holidays as I see it are about the traditions AND the religion

__________________

If you can't stand behind our troops, feel free to stand in front of them!
http://www.spcnicholasidalski.com

evilbrent

I guess that, being Australian, I'm not quite so upset about where American traditions come from.

As one not-overly-polite british person said to me once "you're all just f***ing convicts anyway."