Wreckers

- First !!

2nd


Merry Christmas all.. No text msg this year as i got tired of getting the "and who is this?" replys ..

so you can text me on 0428756623 and i can "and who is this?" in reply. (or you could just include your name)

Lots of love all and a happy new year.

From
Rag and Runp.

Merry Christmas to one and all

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukka (spelling?)

Oh and most importantly - Happy Birthday Ailsha

Merry Christmas everyone

Hope you all have a great day.

And happy birthday Ailsha

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays or whatever it is you celebrate (a good beer?)

and Happy Birthday Ailsha

Merry Christmas Everyone, See you After the Holiday

May the ancient celebrations of Yuletide bring much festivities to you all.

Yuletide is the old pagan mid-winter celebrations where the frozen northern climes celebrated the turning point of winter back to summer. It was the shortest sunlight hours of the year, when they knew if their food stocks would last them through, when the food that was about to be unusable was used up in a major feast, when children conceived at this time of the year, would be born in a time of plentiful food supplies and milder conditions and ensure a higher chance of survival.

The midwinter festival generally started around winter solstice and lasted for around 12 days. Some communities regarded winter solstice as the start of a new year, others celebrated the new year about a week later.

From this Yuletide celebration, we get the '12 days of christmas'. and especially Twelth Night, the yule log, the tradition of having a tree bough in the house, the traditions of mistletoe and holly and many other pagan rituals.

When the christians invaded northern Europe and supplanted the earlier religious beliefs with their middle eastern religious philosophies, the christians knew that these older celebrations were much too deeply ingrained in the people so they declared the Yule celebration to be jc's birthday and usurped the celebtration in that way.

In some Christian communities and religious groups even today, the act of celebrating christmas is seen as worshipping a pagan ritual. At one stage, several states of the USA made the celebrations an illegal act.

And don't let anyone tell you about some Saint Something who supposedly lived in Macedonia or some place, there is absolutely no proof of his existence. He was invented by the church, named a saint so that the name sounded similar, once again, invented to usurp the original pagan character. The tradition of Santa Claus goes way way back in time to ancient Nordic mythology.

It must be Xmass Miruwin is out in force!

Merry Yuletide Miru

Whether it be Pagan or Christian - as long as there be food, drink and presents, I'm happy

I like to think of myself as an Epicurian celebrator of Christmas

Thanks Miru very insightful, might go read up on it myself now

Merry whatever to everyone

Merry excuse to drink copious amounts of beer and have a happy hangover all.

Bring on that thing called New Years already, I demand more shenanigans!

Who's birthday is it again?

Selinea wrote:as long as there be food, drink and presents

You forgot beer /slap

Falern.

IF there was such a person as Jesus Christ, it is highly improbable that his birthdate was actually in December. Most historians believe that his birth probably occurred in September, approximately six months after Passover. One thing they agree on is that it is very unlikely that Jesus was born in December, since the bible records shepherds tending their sheep in the fields on that night. This is quite unlikely to have happened during a cold Judean winter.

In ancient Babylon, the feast of the Son of Isis (Goddess of Nature) was celebrated on December 25. Raucous partying, gluttonous eating and drinking, and gift-giving were traditions of this feast.

In Rome, the Winter Solstice was celebrated many years before the birth of Christ. The Romans called their winter holiday Saturnalia, honoring Saturn, the God of Agriculture. In January, they observed the Kalends of January, which represented the triumph of life over death. This whole season was called Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. The festival season was marked by much merrymaking. It is in ancient Rome that the tradition of the Mummers was born. The Mummers were groups of costumed singers and dancers who traveled from house to house entertaining their neighbors. From this, the Christmas tradition of caroling was born.

In northern Europe, many other traditions that we now consider part of Christian worship were begun long before the participants had ever heard of Christ. The pagans of northern Europe celebrated the their own winter solstice, known as Yule. Yule was symbolic of the pagan Sun God, Mithras, being born, and was observed on the shortest day of the year. As the Sun God grew and matured, the days became longer and warmer. It was customary to light a candle to encourage Mithras, and the sun, to reappear next year.

Huge Yule logs were burned in honor of the sun. The word Yule itself means “wheel,” the wheel being a pagan symbol for the sun. Mistletoe was considered a sacred plant, and the custom of kissing under the mistletoe began as a fertility ritual. Hollyberries were thought to be a food of the gods.

The tree is the one symbol that unites almost all the northern European winter solstices. Live evergreen trees were often brought into homes during the harsh winters as a reminder to inhabitants that soon their crops would grow again. Evergreen boughs were sometimes carried as totems of good luck and were often present at weddings, representing fertility. The Druids used the tree as a religious symbol, holding their sacred ceremonies while surrounding and worshipping huge trees.

In 350, Pope Julius I declared that Christ’s birth would be celebrated on December 25. There is little doubt that he was trying to make it as painless as possible for pagan Romans (who remained a majority at that time) to convert to Christianity. The new religion went down a bit easier, knowing that their feasts would not be taken away from them.

Christmas (Christ-Mass) as we know it today, most historians agree, began in Germany, though Catholics and Lutherans still disagree about which church celebrated it first. The earliest record of an evergreen being decorated in a Christian celebration was in 1521 in the Alsace region of Germany. A prominent Lutheran minister of the day cried blasphemy: “Better that they should look to the true tree of life, Christ.”

The controversy continues even today in some fundamentalist sects.

Basically, what we have with Christmas is wide range of beliefs, from modern day Israel, through Rome and through most European but especially Nordic areas, all cobbled together to create what we today see as our Christmas celebrations.

Merry Christmas to all, enjoy familly and friends.

/hugs

Miruwin wrote:Yuletide is the old pagan mid-winter celebrations...

They stole Easter from the pagans too. I suppose it made christianity
more palatable.

Anyhow, happy pagan rituals to you all. See you in the new year on Bertox

Back to eating and drinking...

Yeah - Easter was a feast celebrating the Goddess of the Dawn/Light and who was also regarded as a fertility goddess, which was celebrated at the spring equinox. It won't come as a surprise to anyone that our modern Easter celebrations fall around about the spring equinox, however, once again its a movable feast since the church got its hands on the festival.

If Easter is supposed to be commemorating the death of Jesus Christ, why is the festival dependent on the cycle of the moon and not on a specific date?

The names of the goddess ranged from Rome with Astara, to England and the Celts and Hretha, Eostre or Eostra (depending on the area of Great Britain), the Germanic peoples with Astarte, Icelandic Austri, Norse form Austra. She is often represented in Norse mythology as Freyja.

Adding to this is the old Germanic word 'ostar' which means movement towards the rising sun as did the old Norse term austr and the Anglo-Saxon eastor and the Gothic austr which also compares to the Latin term auster.

Ostara, Eástre seems therefore to have been the divinity of the radiant dawn, of upspringing light, a joy and blessing, whose meaning could be easily adapted by the resurrection-day of the christian's God. Bonfires were lighted at Easter and according to popular belief of long standing, the moment the sun rises on Easter Sunday morning, he gives three joyful leaps, he dances for joy. Water drawn on the Easter morning is, like that at Christmas, holy and healing. Pagan practices have been usurped by christian festivals. Maidens clothed in white, who at Easter, at the season of returning spring, show themselves in clefts of the rock and on mountains, are suggestive of the ancient goddess

As for the rabbits and eggs and stuff, whatever connection the hare may have had with the ritual of Saxon or British worship, there are good grounds for believing that the sacredness of this animal reaches back into an age still more remote, where it is a very important part of the great Spring Festival of the prehistoric inhabitants of this island. Supposedly, Eostre's light, as goddess of the dawn, was carried by hares. She certainly represented spring fecundity, and love and carnal pleasure that leads to fecundity and this is where we get the giving of eggs.