Why did the Catholics steal all the good holidays in the olden days?

March 19th, 2010

  • Christmas... Originally a Pagan holiday, celebrating the Winter Solstice
    Halloween... Originally a Pagan holiday, celebrating the Harvest and the dead
    Easter, Originally a Pagan holiday celebrating the coming of spring...

    Why are olden day catholics so mean? =(

    BTW - Since Christmas is officially recognized by the country, its a secular holiday. Eat THAT!


  • you sound as pushy as them how about no friggen holidays ever anymore just total unemployment f%ck it all.


  • It's no great secret that the Catholics stole just about everything from Pagans is it?

    Ancient Catholics wanted Pagans to come over to the Catholic side from what limited things I understand...So, in order to induce any Pagans... the Church adopted as much Pagan stuff as possible.



  • Christmas= Christian holiday celebrated on December 25th as the birth of Jesus Christ.
    Winter solstice=pagan holiday celebrated on December 21

    Hanukkah begins on the 21st also, are you going to tell the Jewish people they stole your holiday too?

    Catholic Christians also celebrate the day of the dead, its called All Saints Eve and all Souls day

    Christians also celebrate Resurrection Sunday which falls on your Easter .

    get a grip, you dont own the calendar. What is the big deal that we all share something in common such as the day that our holidays fall on?


  • I 100% agree. We can celebrate Christmas, but calling a Yule tree a Christmas tree is silly.


  • If you put a star or angel on top of your tree you are recognizing it as a Christan holiday. The act of giving is also recognized as Christ being born and becoming the greatest gift of all.

    I wonder where exactly you got your information from. CHRISTmas is obviously bout Christ. Or else it wouldn't be called what it is today. It's not necessarily Christ's birthday, but we use this day now (Dec. 25th) as his birthday.

    All hallows eve was a pagan holiday. It was the day before all-saint's-day. I am not Catholic but it's not hard to do some research.

    Easter was the day Christ rose from the dead. It's like new life. Which can be seen today as spring coming because new life is coming forth. Now the world puts eggs, and chocolates, and bunnies into it so the true meaning is masked.


  • I dont understand why people have such a sinister view about this. The Catholic Church is clear that they put their holidays on the same days as pagan holidays, but really, so what.

    Im Catholic and we celebrate Easter on a different day that the Greek Orthodox. Its not like I choose to be Catholic based on this reason. Obviously, this would be absured. So why then do people think that Catholics put Christmas on a Pagan holiday to gain followers? Its not like one day pagans would accidently celebrate Christmas and then be Christians. It just sounds so dumb to me.

    The reason why the Chruch did this was purely practicle. These holidays were observed for centuries, people had traditions going back for centuries reguarding these holidays. So this was a way pagans can convert to Christianity and still keep their ancient traditions.

    Also, keep in mind that very early Christians were percicuted. So if you wanted to keep your Christianity a secret, you had to celebrate the same pagan holidays. Well, why not celebrate the Birt of Christ on the same day the Romans are celebrating. It avoids suspicion, and makes sence.

    But really, this whole idea that Christians stole these holidays to brain wash people is stupid and doesn't stand to historical scrutiny. Its amazing how dumb some people can be when it comes to history.



    And your idea that Roman Catholics "slaughtered" pagans who didn't celebrate is entirely false and I suggest you do some research. I wont argue that Christians never persicuted pagans, they did. But the fact is that paganism lastes long into the 6th century maybe even the 10th century and after the fall of Rome their was no central authority to persicute pagans. Maybe some nutjob European kings slaughtered pagans, but it wasn't on the large scale. And alsom many Christians accused others CHRISTIANS of retaining too many of these pagan traditions during this time. So Christians themselves often admitted that the preserved pagan tradition.


  • Kindly explain how "celebrate also" and adding a few of their own things to it equates "stealing".


  • well, they didn't want to follow god's holidays from the tanakh, those were too jewish

    they didn't have the imagination to make up there own

    so they make it easier for the forcible converted pagan, the bulk of the medieval church, they used their holidays with minor changes


  • come on man, thats too easy
    to convert pagans and other non beleivers, as that was the easy way to do so

    YEAH!!!!!!!

    yeah eat THAT, secular YEAH!!!!!!!!1




    tebone

    fesitval of isis, dec 25th, consists of prezzies gatherings and partying

    or are you unaware of that?

    do you honestly think it matters what details there are about which pagan tradition and celebration christianity overtook?
    cos most of the rest of the world, doesnt
    but, hey if you do, theres a detail, and that IS the stolen holiday and date AND all the traditions
    from babylonian times


    no dear, no one "owns" the calendar, but pagans do "own" those traditional dates and the traditions
    its up to you if you prefer to deny that


  • You do know it was the Pagans themselves that caused this. They converted and wanted to celebrate on their old holidays.

    I let you slide when you have these opium dreams but some people will just think you're a clown. We can't have that. '


  • I thought that a lot of Christians hated Halloween becuase of witchcraft and whatnot. Anyway, Christmas was ripped off of Yule. Christmas itself wasn't thought up by Pagans. Easter was, however. Wasn't Eastre the goddess of fertility or something? The Christians wanted to monopolize the holiday glory from the Pagans.


  • Same reason why the gays want to steal marriage


  • So the pagans OWN winter, fall and spring celebrations? Not.

    Christians are welcome to celebrate their holy days any time of the year. No faith or religious group can take ownership of a particular time.

    But, when people began to convert to Christianity, it made sense to allow them to celebrate their new found faith with new celebrations. When winter came around, the converts would no longer have their winter solstice celebration because they now believed in Jesus Christ. But, they could celebrate something important to their new religion...the birth of the Savior.

    It makes good sense to me.


  • They weren't stolen. They were incorporated to make it easier for other cultures to accept Christianity. Its awesome that Christmas is officially recognized because then we all get it off, maybe at the very least you should be thankful that you get the day off too.


  • Well apparently, this was because converting people to a completely different religion was always going to be hard so they deliberately built their religion on the foundations already laid by paganism.

    For example on halloween pagans originally believed that in the time between sunset and sunrise was a time when the dead could walk among them because they believed the year ended at sunset and didn't officially begin until morning and that the in between time allowed the dead to cross over. They wore scary masks etc. to keep away the evil spirits. Thus halloween was born.

    Christians incorporated this pagan belief into their religion to make it more acceptable to pagans who they wished to convert and in november Christians pray for the dead.

    It is the same with the other holidays too i imagine.


  • Catholics stole everything, from their rituals, clothing, all the way to holidays.

    lol@ the person above me


  • Easter was not a Pagen holiday. Christians celebrate it as the death of Jesus. Christmas is the birth of Jesus. and Halloween is not a Christian holiday, i do not kno why you would think that it was. Get your facts streaight before you state them.
    The Catholics are not mean that was there faith that they knew and that was their religon.
    :D
    Marry Christmas


  • The Church believed that such celebrations were unholy because they did not celebrate God, and that they should not be practiced by members. But they could not convert people because they saw nothing wrong with the celebrations, and wouldn't give them up to join the church. So the church compromised by "Christianizing" the celebrations.


  • I'm very sorry you don't know how to use a dictionary.

    Christmas (emphasis mine):

    "Etymology: Middle English Christemasse, from Old English Cristes mæsse, literally, CHRIST'S mass"

    "a CHRISTIAN feast on December 25 or among some Eastern Orthodox Christians on January 7 that commemorates the birth of CHRIST and is usually observed as a legal holiday"
    http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionar...

    Halloween:

    "Etymology: short for All Hallow Even (All Saints' Eve)"
    http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionar...

    Easter (emphasis mine):

    "a feast that commemorates CHRIST'S resurrection and is observed with variations of date due to different calendars on the first Sunday after the paschal full moon"
    http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionar...


    >>Merriam Webster doesn't constitute as FACT.<<

    What kind of discussion can we have if you are free to define words however you see fit? Can I redefine "working" to mean "kicking" and "weekends" to mean "puppies"?

    >>the FACT is that Christmas and Easter were Pagan holidays before the Roman Catholics slaughtered Pagans who were forcibly converted, who still practiced those holidays.<<

    Pagans commemorated the birth and resurrection of Christ? Why would they do that?


  • They didn't steal them. They just BORROWED them. That's why so many staunch fundies are willing to give them back. Didn't you see the number of posts saying Hallow's eve was Satanic and no TRUE christians should celebrate? Same for Easter and Xmas, lots o' people even refuse to call Easter "Easter" any more and insist on calling it "resurrection day" since Easter is the name of a Germanic, rabbit-headed fertility goddess.







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