A former leading theologian, in a book entitled Oh, Come On All Ye Faithful, Be Serious, has claimed he had to leave the Christian religion because he became too embarrassed about the nonsense they sing in Christmas carols.
In the book, he writes:
As most people know, the whole story of the nativity has more to do with the plot of a soap opera than with events in the Middle-East a couple of centuries ago. Most of the nativity tale itself was nicked wholesale from the Roman cult of Mithras, while the rest was made up to fit in with what the Old Testament prophets had said, in order to make Jesus appear to be the Messiah they had prophesised.
So, if you celebrate Christmas because you think that Jesus seemed like a pretty decent sort of bloke, you have to realise that the Christmas story featured in all the carols you are yodelling has almost certainly has nothing at all to do with the bloke himself. Basically, it is all a PR job. No different - in a way – to all those TV adverts you bemoan, claiming that they are destroying the true meaning of Christmas.
Elsewhere in the book the ex-theologian tells of how the rest of the ‘Traditional Christmas’ story, such as Yule logs, Christmas trees, Santa Claus and so forth date all the way back to the Victorian age, where the old European pre-Christian winter solstice rites and rituals were incorporated into the Christian Christmas event, often subtly altered to fit in with the overall Christian theme.
He goes on to say:
Most people, by the time they reach adulthood, have realised that the Christian Christmas story has about as much to do with reality as the plot of Disney’s Bambi, and yet they still allow this completely made-up ‘religion’ to have influence over their lives.
We all know that the period we now call Christmas is – in reality – a special time that goes right back to the dawn of civilisation, possibly right back to near the dawn of mankind itself. The Midwinter period around the solstice, for example, seems to have been a time of special significance for the builders of Stonehenge, and other such sites.
As it is the shortest day of the year, the death of the old year, as it were. It is easy to see why it had, and still has such an appeal to humans. The Christmas story is just another thin layer of veneer over what is a very, very old time of celebration. Christianity can no more claim it as its own than they can claim ownership of the moon, and yet they keep on trying to make it exclusive to them.
A leading evil godless atheist welcomed the ex-theologian’s book, saying:
Actually, rather than all this constant bollocks we get at this time of year about ‘the real meaning of Christmas’ we ought to be campaigning to take back the midwinter solstice from all these religions that keep trying to appropriate it.
Instead, we ought to make a serious attempt to get people to see the wonders of the universe they live in - freed from all this religious mumbo-jumbo – and how the sheer absolute wonder of the universe dwarfs everything these petty, tiresome, little religions can ever say about it and our place within it.
However, a Christian pressure group called for an end to what they see as this constant criticism of religion, saying ‘Christmas should be a time for the whole family to get together religiously. It is not for sitting alone bashing the bishop.’
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