What is your favorite tradition on christmas?

Answer 1

The adults in the family bring a Wrapped Christmas Ornament and we draw numbers to see who gets to pick the first package. The first person opens their gift....second person either robs the gift from the first person or opens another gift. The further down the line you are the better choices you have of gifts to rob. If your ornament gets robbed you go to the pile and pick a new item. This ends after all of the numbers have selected a gift.....number one is the real winner because if that person chooses they can rob one time (since they couldn't in the beginning.) all the ornaments stay where they landed at that point. It is alot of fun. After the game is over you can trade if you want. Chrildren also can join in if they want.

Answer 2

my favorite tandition is have yam and eggnog and have a family dinner on Christmas. We also like to decorate our beuatiful tree and show our christmas spirit. On christmas eve we would go door to door and sing to people with out family band. My son Jeff would always sit on santa's lap on dec. 20 and ask for all kinds of weird things. Last year he asked for pink bunny

Answer 3

I love going out and getting a real tree, walking around in the cool air and looking for the prettiest tree, then getting it home and setting it up while the house fills with the lovely pine smell. Then decorating it with all the old family ornaments and then looking at the beautiful lights when its dark outside.
=)
that put me in a good mood just typing it

Answer 4

We would start singing carols at home then go to our aunt's & uncle's home singing and playing guitars, guido's and maracha's, have a drink, then continue on with everyone from their house, to another aunt's & uncle's home, picking up aunt's , uncles, cousins, along the way till we ended up at Grandma's (Mama's & Papa's) Grandpa's home all singing and playing instruments outside their front door. Go inside eat, drink, dance, all having a great time.
It's called (algonaldoing?) in Puerto Rico

Answer 5

That is a toughy, I love to decorating the tree, wrapping gifts, along with looking foward to having my snack foods and spiked eggnog on x-mas eve and a nice big, thick juicy steak, baked potato and salad on x-mas day!

Answer 6

midnight mass on Christmas eve that is so special. we have a small orchestra and choir it is so special and then we walk home in the clear midnight air and this is our Christmas tradition

Answer 7

Watching the christmas story marathon on tv all day

Answer 8

Our Happy Birthday Jesus party we have on Christmas.

Answer 9

All the pagan festivities and tradition.

Is Christmas a celebration based on the Bible?

Date of the celebration

M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopædia says: “The observance of Christmas is not of divine appointment, nor is it of N[ew] T[estament] origin. The day of Christ’s birth cannot be ascertained from the N[ew] T[estament], or, indeed, from any other source.”—(New York, 1871), Vol. II, p. 276.

Luke 2:8-11 shows that shepherds were in the fields at night at the time of Jesus’ birth. The book Daily Life in the Time of Jesus states: “The flocks . . . passed the winter under cover; and from this alone it may be seen that the traditional date for Christmas, in the winter, is unlikely to be right, since the Gospel says that the shepherds were in the fields.”—(New York, 1962), Henri Daniel-Rops, p. 228.

The Encyclopedia Americana informs us: “The reason for establishing December 25 as Christmas is somewhat obscure, but it is usually held that the day was chosen to correspond to pagan festivals that took place around the time of the winter solstice, when the days begin to lengthen, to celebrate the ‘rebirth of the sun.’ . . . The Roman Saturnalia (a festival dedicated to Saturn, the god of agriculture, and to the renewed power of the sun), also took place at this time, and some Christmas customs are thought to be rooted in this ancient pagan celebration.”—(1977), Vol. 6, p. 666.

The New Catholic Encyclopedia acknowledges: “The date of Christ’s birth is not known. The Gospels indicate neither the day nor the month . . . According to the hypothesis suggested by H. Usener . . . and accepted by most scholars today, the birth of Christ was assigned the date of the winter solstice (December 25 in the Julian calendar, January 6 in the Egyptian), because on this day, as the sun began its return to northern skies, the pagan devotees of Mithra celebrated the dies natalis Solis Invicti (birthday of the invincible sun). On Dec. 25, 274, Aurelian had proclaimed the sun-god principal patron of the empire and dedicated a temple to him in the Campus Martius. Christmas originated at a time when the cult of the sun was particularly strong at Rome.”—(1967), Vol. III, p. 656.

Wise men, or Magi, led by a star

Those Magi were actually astrologers from the east. (Matt. 2:1, 2, NW; NE) Although astrology is popular among many people today, the practice is strongly disapproved in the Bible. (See pages 144, 145, under the main heading “Fate.”) Would God have led to the newborn Jesus persons whose practices He condemned?

Matthew 2:1-16 shows that the star led the astrologers first to King Herod and then to Jesus and that Herod then sought to have Jesus killed. No mention is made that anyone other than the astrologers saw the “star.” After they left, Jehovah’s angel warned Joseph to flee to Egypt to safeguard the child. Was that “star” a sign from God or was it from someone who was seeking to have God’s Son destroyed?

Note that the Bible account does not say that they found the babe Jesus in a manger, as customarily depicted in Christmas art. When the astrologers arrived, Jesus and his parents were living in a house. As to Jesus’ age at that time, remember that, based on what Herod had learned from the astrologers, he decreed that all the boys in the district of Bethlehem two years of age and under were to be destroyed.—Matt. 2:1, 11, 16.

Gift giving as part of the celebration; stories about Santa Claus, Father Christmas, etc.

The practice of Christmas gift giving is not based on what was done by the Magi. As shown above, they did not arrive at the time of Jesus’ birth. Furthermore, they gave gifts, not to one another, but to the child Jesus, in accord with what was then customary when visiting notable persons.

The Encyclopedia Americana states: “During the Saturnalia . . . feasting prevailed, and gifts were exchanged.” (1977, Vol. 24, p. 299) In many instances that represents the spirit of Christmas giving—an exchanging of gifts. The spirit reflected in such gift giving does not bring real happiness, because it violates Christian principles such as those found at Matthew 6:3, 4 and 2 Corinthians 9:7. Surely a Christian can give gifts to others as an expression of love at other times during the year, doing so as often as he wants to.

Depending on where they live, children are told that gifts are brought by Santa Claus, St. Nicholas, Father Christmas, Père Noël, Knecht Ruprecht, the Magi, the elf Jultomten (or Julenissen), or a witch known as La Befana. (The World Book Encyclopedia, 1984, Vol. 3, p. 414) Of course, none of these stories are actually true. Does the telling of such stories build in children a respect for truth, and does such a practice honor Jesus Christ, who taught that God must be worshiped with truth?—John 4:23, 24.

Answer 10

Convincing the parents of snotty, spoiled kids to take the money they would normally spend on the brat they spawned and give it to the kids in need who truly deserve it.