This Page Last Updated January 18th, 2010 (new style reckoning)
Christmas Concerns
This Coca-Cola photo is from the back of a decades old magazine
Will the real holy day please stand up
Among the many misguided ideas of Christmas is the modern Santa Claus. Today his real life is often mocked. He is not the fat and jolly sort that Coca-Cola commercialism has promoted him to be (Coca-Cola once used cocaine in it, now it has other poisons). Early in the 4th century St. Nicholas was known for giving gifts in stockings to the needy. It is good to remember and follow his example of sacrificial giving. He was a bishop who struck the heretic Arius in the face for his blasphemies against the Son of God and His Most Pure Mother. The day of his commemoration is about 3 weeks before the Nativity (ROZHDESTVO) of the Lord.
Webster’s dictionary says that the word “Christmas” comes from the Middle English word “Christemasse” (from just before the 12th century), it means “Christ’s Mass” and comes to us from the Pope’s church. The Old Orthodox Christians believes that the Latin church departed the faith since 1054 A.D., so the word “Christmas” should not even be used. The Protestants have continued in erroneous western inventions of Christmas ever themselves, so be cautious of them.
It is important to consider which calendar to use when dating important days. When Christ was born all the known world was using the pagan Julian calendar. Christianity became legalized in the 4th century and finally had an opportunity (being guided by the Holy Spirit) to established its own liturgical calendar. This changed no times or seasons. The Christian calendar corresponded with the Julian calendar, but pagans do not have a monopoly on days or months of the year.
The early Christians dated years according to the chronology that has become known as Anno Mundi (A.M.), which counts years from the creation of Adam and Eve (not the creation of the world). The early Church reckoned dates counting the weeks from crucial events such as the feast of Pentecost (a movable feast), stating the day of the week first, then the week of the year and lastly adding the years from the creation of Adam and Eve. So the Christian calendar dates are calculated each year, by calculating the movable feast of Pascha (the Greek word for Passover [the day of Christ’s Resurrection is the Christian Passover, as Christ passed over death]). Many people who wrongly suppose that they are Christians call the day of the Resurrection by the pagan goddess name of Easter, that is an atrocity. We can use all things in order to reach other people, even the Apostle’s preached about pagan gods, but we should not bring them into Christian worship. I do not think that the Apostles would use all modern things, such as petroleum.
So the proper way for an Old Orthodox Russian Christian to specify the date of the next Nativity of Christ (keeping in mind that the New Year is in what people today know as the month of September) is that it falls on, “The sixth day of the 33rd week after Pentecost, of the year 7519 from the Creation of Adam and Eve”. That is, if I have my calculations right.
On the original Christian calendar evenings are the start of the day, and then there is the morning. Each day starts and ends with sunset, so the evening of the Nativity is the start of the day, not midnight. A great number of people in the world use the Gregorian calendar. It was commissioned by Pope Gregory in 1582 A.D. (the calendar being created by pagans). The date for the Old Orthodox Nativity of Christ would begin on the sunset of January 6th, according to the Gregorian calendar; it ends at sunset on their January 7th. According to the reckoning of the ancient Julian calendar this is the start of the actual day of December 25th, which corresponds to the Christian liturgical day of the Nativity of Christ.
December 25th on the Gregorian calendar is approximately 13 days earlier than the day the Old Orthodox recognize as the Nativity of Christ. The Russian Old Orthodox Christians believe that the popes had been making many mistakes long before Pope Gregory; for them the new pagan made Gregorian calendar is just another terrible mistake, or one of many heresies. This ‘out of order’ calendar of the pope is what most of our godless society uses today. I see the Old Calendar date as being more correctly assigned, because those with the best judgment used it, it has been used for the longest time and by all the good Christians. I see no good reason for recognizing one holy day twice in a single year, so I stay with the time tested one. To mix up holy days only sows yet even more discord among an already fouled faith of the popes and the rest.
Many claim that we should not even celebrate a day of the Lord’s Nativity due to it previously being of some pagan origin. I do not see how pagans can make any day their sole possession. It certainly would be wrong to practice pagan things. To recognize a day of God’s salvation plan, where His Son is given to the world, is not wrong. It further shows what God actually has done and gives us the opportunity to give Him more glory, to dedicate even more time to that specific thought and make it more a part of our own lives. I believe we should stop and remove any pagan practices that are contradictory to God, but we cannot remove a whole day from the calendar just because somebody wrongly claims it is paganism. There are so many pagan festivals that it would be a practical impossibility to avoid all of them anyway. God set a calendar with times and seasons to recognizing His plan for mankind. Pagans cannot overrule what God has done. Those who say that godly people cannot use a pagan day (which God actually made in the first place) are missing the whole point of our days here on earth, they oppose the celebration of holy days which God in His infinite wisdom instituted long before we were born.
There are also people who question the use of Christmas trees, the Yule log, holly, mistletoe, etc. I really do not know of any good source for the use of such items in the home. I personally think that Christmas trees are a waste of time and money, something that makes a complete mess and the decorations are not easily disposed of. Till I find some good reason to use such decorations I will not. I also think that the words of the holy prophet Jeremiah should make us reconsider doing such things. Jeremiah 10:2-4 Thus saith the LORD, Learn ye not the ways of the heathen... For the customs of the nations are vain; it is a tree cut out of the forest, the work of the carpenter, or a molten image. They are beautified with silver and gold; they fix them with hammers and nails. (LXX)
Christ said that when He would leave the world His people would fast. As the commemoration of His birth is a great Feast the wisdom of the Church has prescribed a 40 day fast to precede the commemoration of His Nativity. It is not proper to have Christmas parties during this time of fasting, as so many in our modern world do. The practice of decorating during the fast is also contradictory to the ancient Christian practice. Old Believers actually take down the decorations in the home, making it as bare as possible, so it will be clean in preparation for the feast of the Nativity. The same thing is done at Paskha. So many things are mixed up today with how people look at this period of time during the year.
It should be noted that when the colony’s were begun in what is now the eastern United States that they followed the ancient Julian calendar just as the original Christians did. Then they changed to the papal calendar in the year 1752. England changed their civil calendar at the same time and there was said to be an outrage by the people who said, “Give us back our eleven days!” which was the difference between the two calendars at that time. Here is one
reference.
Also, Pope Gregory changed his calendar thinking that it was an improvement, but it is disputable whether or not his new calendar is actually more accurate. Besides, for faithful Christians, scientific astronomical accuracy is not of utmost concern; having historical continuity, a changeless of faith and commitment to doctrine and practice are the concern. Being in union and have agreement is seen as being the truly important things.
Another point is the day chosen by the ancient Christians for the day of the New Year, it corresponds to September 14th on the Gregorian calendar (September 1st on the Julian calendar). The Church New Year should be specified liturgically according to how many days and weeks it has been from Pentecost. We should not bring into Church liturgical practices any of the names of pagans as are specified in the pagan days of the week or months. Today Christians should use the Christian form of dating their liturgical days, even though pagan or heretical dates correspond. The world in our modern times celebrates their New Year on January 1st (Gregorian calendar) and this happens to conflict with the Old Orthodox Christian 40 day fast prior to the Nativity of Christ. The parties are a bad influence and we should work to avoid them as much as possible, even to the point of being completely separate from this world.
Poinsettias in America are a hybrid mutation and the use of them comes from the Papist’s. There is really no good example for the way they are used nowadays. In a time when everybody works to be so traditional they happen to be a contrary invention. I simply would not even consider having something which tries to out do God’s design, like the development of the modernist hybrid Poinsettia. There is almost nothing left today that is the way God planned it to be, nearly everything is genetically altered and therefore fake. We truly do live in more of a make-believe world than we know. My goal is to get away from it all.
One more thing is that the Gregorian calendar, which most people use for their civil calendar, sometimes causes the calculation for the Resurrection of Christ to fall before the Jewish Passover. This contradicts the ancient Christian teaching that the Resurrection of Christ is never to be placed before the Jewish Passover. Christ actually rose from the dead after the Jewish Passover.
The bottom line is this. I hope, with all tenaciousness, to keep what I have found which is good. That would include not using the heretical terminology of “Christmas”, not following the questionable practices of the papal calendar and not having pagan-like decorated trees, etc. To decorate during a time when restraint is called for (like the Nativity fast) makes no sense at all. I do not wish to be mean-spirited toward others who follow a different way, but if others would reconsider these things for themselves I think it would be nice.
This photo is of an ancient icon by Andrei Rublev