As St. Paul says: "For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; his eternal power also, and divinity" Romans 1:20
From the very beginning, Christians understood that God, and specifically the Son, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the Logos of God, is the source, the cause and the sustainer of all reality, and that the same God underpins what they saw as 'pagan' festivals ... nor that pagan festivals were necessarily wrong, for if all truth is one, then there will be a correlation between natural religions, and supernatural revelation.
The pagan sources of Christmas are well attested, but not so well known are the Christian sources that fed into the discussions.
Clement of Alexandria (d. 215AD) records that some Christians of the time placed his birth date in April (Stromata I:21). Hippolytus (d. 236AD) may have believed that Jesus was born on April 2nd, but there is also evidence he believed Jesus was born on December 25th. What we can assume is that there was no fixed date for the birth Of Jesus in the early Church.
The current date of the celebration of Christmas took hundreds of years to become established throughout the entire Church.
One of the reasons for selecting December 25 is from early Christian cosmology. Sextus Julius Africanus (c220AD) speculated that the world was created on March 25th, based on his chronology of Jewish and Christian history. He suggested that Christ was conceived on that date, as with the Incarnation, a new creation began. This would place His birth in December.
Hippolytus of Rome (c225AD) mentions the date of Christmas as December 25 ("eight days before the kalends of January"), in the Commentary on Daniel. This may be an interpolation, however. The best manuscripts of Hippolytus mention both December 25th and April 2nd as possible dates for the birth of Jesus, although again the latter could refer to his conception, which would then place his birth in December.
Another reason behind the dating is based on the estimated date of the death of Christ, with some theologians suggesting March 25th. Based on the Jewish idea of the "integral age," that great prophets were conceived on the same date as their death, led them to suggest March 25th (in fact most unlikely).
Saint John Chrysostom forwarded another idea:
Luke 1 says Zechariah was performing priestly duty in the Temple when an angel told his wife Elizabeth she would bear John the Baptist. During the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, Mary learned about her conception of Jesus and visited Elizabeth "with haste."
The 24 classes of Jewish priests served one week in the Temple, and Zechariah was in the eighth class. Calculating from Rabbinical tradition, Zechariah's class would have been serving Oct. 2-9 in 5BC. So Mary's conception visit six months later might have occurred the following March and Jesus' birth nine months afterward.
Thus, for John Chrysostom, the date of December 25 was based on Scripture and Jewish tradition. While it is possible John was mistaken, this demonstrates that Christians at the time were choosing the dates of feasts based on Scripture, not paganism.
Another possibility:
The angel Gabriel appeared to Mary "in the sixth month" (Luke 1:26) of the Jewish year ... February-March. Count nine months for the pregnancy and you come to November/December.
According to some Church Fathers, Jesus was born during Channukah. Thus Christ was born Festival of Lights. December again.
So there are multiple reasons why ancient Christians chose December 25th as the date to celebrate the birth of Jesus. And while we may not agree with the reasoning behind the choice of December 25th, the idea that the date is purely pagan is unfounded.
In the 3rd-4th centuries Christians had been engaged in a propaganda war with pagans since the Emperor Aurelian established the Sol Invictus, the feast of the unconquered Sun, on December 25th. For Christians, Christ is the Son of God, and the Sun of Righteousness (cf Malachi 4:2). In fact, Aurelian may have established the Sol Invictus because of the rising popularity of Christianity, and may have established the date of the Sol Invictus in response to Christian celebrations already occurring that day!
Since Christians, it's reckoned, accounted for ten percent of the population of Rome at the time, this is not far-fetched in the least.
As regards Saturnalia, since that festival ended at the latest on December 23, the claim that Christmas was chosen to coincide with Saturnalia is rather weak. However, since the celebration of Saturnalia occurred around Christmas time, it is very possible that this made December 25th, already celebrated by many Christians as Christ's birth because of Jewish and Christian reasons, even more of an ideal date, because it offered an alternative to the popular Saturnalia festival in Rome.
To pose the question again, "is there anything wrong with Christians borrowing some practices and concepts from pagan festivals?" The Catholic and Orthodox answers are "no."
Did Christians put an end to pagan customs? No. Did some Saturnalia customs become associated with the Christmas feast because the dates of the festivals were close to one another? Undoubtedly.
Christians absorbed these customs, looking beyond the forms to their metaphysical significance. Thus, worship of the sun is transposed to the worship of the Sun of Righteousness: Jesus Christ.
But to suppose that December 25 rests solely, or even mainly, on pagan tradition is demonstrably erroneous.
Thomas
