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Question for non-religious Christmas celebrators
I want to preface this post by saying that I don't wish to come across judgemental ... And, I don't really want to get into a debate about religion. I am genuinely curious about others' celebrations around this time of year.
I've seen several posts recently by people who have said they are atheists, but who celebrate Christmas. And, I don't get it -- what do you celebrate? I can understand wanting to be in the spirit of the season and all, but how can you celebrate Christmas without celebrating the birth of Jesus? Why say that you celebrate Christmas? Why not choose to celebrate Hanukah? Do you really just celebrate "winter"? I get much of the commercialization of Christmas is trees and presents and Santa and snowmen, but those are not truly symbols of Christmas....
Re: Question for non-religious Christmas celebrators
My answer may be a little skewed since the half of my family that celebrates Christmas is Methodist, so maybe it does mean something (in a religious sense) to my grandparents and father... For me, Christmas is about family traditions. It's one of the few days of the year where everything shuts down and you spend the day with your family (for better or for worse) - that's why I enjoy celebrating it and will continue to celebrate it. And getting presents doesn't hurt either...
I understand what you are saying about the Christmas holiday originating to celebrate the birth of Christ; hence the reason many people - myself included - get irritated when people assume that everyone, regardless of religion, celebrates Christmas. However, I think for some Americans, it is about the trees, presents, etc. It's just another (often non-religious) holiday, like the 4th of July or Memorial Day, and people enjoy having their own types of celebrations regardless of the origin (e.g. fireworks and barbecues have nothing to do with winning our independence from England, but people celebrate the holiday just the same).
Baby248 - ETA 1/10/13
We are not religious but we come from Christian families. We've chosen to celebrate the secular parts of the holiday season that we enjoy. Just like some people chose to "celebrate" St. Patrick's Day but not the fact that he banished the snakes from Ireland.
This time of year has had festive significance since Roman times of Saturnalia. Christians were not the first (or only) folks to have celebrations during this time of year.
For me, I was raised Catholic and raised with Christmas. It had many things associated with it, only one of which was religious. Giving gifts to family, the giving spirit, the start of winter, spending time with relatives, and of course, cookies
Now there's nothing religious in it to me. I celebrate it like any other holiday-- with family and food!
There's nothing inherently commercial about trees and Santa. (Now, snowmen on the other hand ... just kidding.) Christmas is an amalgamation of several customs from all over the world (some that pre-date Christianization of those peoples) that over the years have been lumped under one umbrella with a decidedly Christian name.
Why do you do anything tree or Santa related? To say that there is only ONE thing to celebrate at Christmas is naive.
I am not religious at all but we do celebrate Christmas as a time to get family together, give gifts, make good food and just enjoy the trees, lights, etc... this would be a really gloomy time of year without all the cheer :-)
I guess I see no correlation between Santa, decorating trees and stringing our house with lights and the birth of Jesus.
I'd say a solid 95% of what goes on in the name of "Christmas" has 0% to do with the baby Jesus (and most of that 95% has its roots in paganism, not Christianity, anyway). I mean, the references in the bible surrounding jesus' birth suggest that he wasn't probably born in winter anyway (shepherds in the--dormant--fields? long journey for a preg lady in the middle of winter? etc.)
I'm an atheist that was raised Christian. Continuing to celebrate Christmas for me is about cultural traditions my family has. It's about twinkle lights & cookies & ornaments & giving & eggnog & santa.
It's incredibly easy to celebrate the "spirit" of christmas w/out referencing any religion.
eta: I'd be down for calling secular celebrations of xmas some other term, but as there's not one fully accepted I don't want to create one & have to explain it over & over again,ya know?
Thanks for the enlightenment from all of you! We, too, celebrate the secular end of Christmas -- Santa visits our house, we have an Elf on a Shelf, lights and tree and presents and family and lots and lots of food. I guess the difference is that we always tie it all back to the fact that the reason we do any of these things at all is because of Christmas Story and Jesus' birth (although, I agree, it probably wasn't in December).
I think for me and DH, our celebration is rooted in the fact that we were both brought up religious (me more so than DH). So we know the stories, we've done the nativities and pageants and Christmas masses and all that.
Now, as adults, we've both decided--separately--that we don't believe what was taught at our churches (Catholic for me, Methodist for DH). I respect people who hold those beliefs, I just don't share them.
So for me, Christmas is a time to be with family and carry on family traditions, to show them how much you love them by giving them a gift that will make them happy, a time to decorate the house at a time that would otherwise be dark and dreary, a time to do good and a general sense of goodwill toward others.
Now that DS is here, we will incorporate the concept of Santa Claus. In my mind, I never really connected him to the story of Jesus' birth.
TTC #2: BFP 12/17/11, m/c 1/7/12 and D&C 1/12/12
baby blog/cooking blog
ditto all of this.
and someone tell me exactly what loading our already extremely fortunate children up with more toys has to do with the birth of Christ. I understand that giving gifts to each other symbolizes the wisemen bringing gifts to Jesus, but I think that we've ventured pretty far from that original model. and devout Christians are just as guilty of this as anyone else.
so why is it hard to imagine that atheists can get into the spirit of capitalism like everyone else?
I agree that the gift giving and capitalistic message at Christmas these days is out of hand. I guess I have just always thought that in my family, we wouldn't celebrate Christian holidays if we weren't Christian and didn't believe the teachings of our church. So, to me, it didn't make sense why people who don't believe still celebrated the holiday.
But, it does make sense to me that people who were raised with those beliefs still want to continue with the family traditions even if they don't believe the Christian teachings. In continuing this conversation with others, I found out that Santa actually brought stockings to a Jewish friends' house each year when she was a child so she didn't feel left out of the holiday spirit. I guess I never really separated the secular aspects of my family's celebration from the religious (even though they have nothing to do with one another), but now know that others do.
As a spin off -- do athiests celebrate Easter? Or a non-religious form of a springtime holiday? Does the Easter Bunny come?
We usually visit my Catholic ILs for Easter, and they do an Easter dinner. If we stayed home one year and the ILs weren't visiting us, I don't think we'd do anything. When M gets older, I'll probably take him to our neighborhood easter egg hunt, but I really don't think eggs/chicks/bunnies have anything to do with the religious holiday. To me, those are really about celebrating the beginning of spring, and somehow they got tied around the Easter holiday, or vice versa. So I guess you could say we celebrate the beginning of spring, but not Easter itself.
I did easter egg hunts and dyed eggs and all of that when I was a kid. I had no idea Easter was a religious holiday. I thought it was just about spring and cute baby animals.
Not necessarily so. History is full of customs from all of the world that involve old men bringing gifts. The history of Santa on Wikipedia has some pretty interesting stuff.
That the thing about Christmas-- why different people do what they do has roots in different customs.
We did the whole Easter basket/Easter egg hunt thing when I was a kid, but we never really had a set tradition, so it's sort of fallen off. If we happen to be visiting my parents that weekend, we'll do dinner with my grandparents, but if we're not around, it's not a big deal. My mom does still buy me a box of Peeps every year though (which, ironically, she usually gives to me when I see her for our Passover seder...).
Baby248 - ETA 1/10/13
Thanks for being non-judgemental and genuinely interested in others' answers.
As far as Easter, my family always celebrates it.
Now that I'm on a computer vs. phone, I can elaborate a bit more. I am an atheist, raised by atheists. However, if you had to define a religion, my mom's family has some Methodists in it and my dad's family is Jewish (although he definitely sees himself as culturally vs. spiritually Jewish).
Christmas was always celebrated in my house. I grew up with it being about family, winter, and lights, and presents, and cookies, and Santa, and giving to others, and trees, ornaments, music, wonderment, etc. It is magical. At some point, I learned the Christmas story (birth of Christ), but that's not part of our celebration. I do love Christmas music, though, and some of the more religious carols are my favorites (O Holy Night, for example).
My dad also celebrates Christmas with us, although I generally make sure that I wrap one of his gifts in Chanukah paper. LOL. He calls the tree the Chanukah bush.
As far as Easter, we do celebrate it. I don't really know how to define why we celebrate it other than as a tradition, but we have ham and asparagus and new potatoes, and Easter baskets. Of course, if you know anything about Judaism, it is pretty funny that my dad is the one who relishes the Easter ham more than anyone else!
my family is/was catholic (some still practice, some don't) so as a kid, we went to church and the easter bunny also visited. i'm essentially agnostic and no longer celebrate. if i happen to be visiting my family then we'll have a family dinner/party, more of a habit from when everyone was required to attend church and a reason to have ham at this point. i haven't been to church on easter since i was young. if we are with my ILs at passover then we celebrate with them.
FYI....this is an interesting article
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/faithbased/2008/12/no_reason_for_the_season.single.html
Actually, if you could explain the Easter Bunny's relation to the death/resurrection of Jesus Christ to me, I would appreciate it. I'm not being snarky--this tradition is one of the weirder ones for me.
We don't have any Easter traditions in our house, although if we are visiting my ILs they give DS a basket. If we're at home, we will sometimes go to dinner at my dad's--always a good excuse for a nice big ham.
TTC #2: BFP 12/17/11, m/c 1/7/12 and D&C 1/12/12
baby blog/cooking blog
I'm an agnostic and so is my husband. I was raised Catholic (baptized, confirmed - but we weren't regular church goers) and my husband's family was raised Catholic so we do celebrate the traditions of the holiday season, much like many of the previous posters.
However, an interesting tidbit, my dad's parents were strict Catholics and always gave us something religiously themed as a present (still do). We used to go over to their house Christmas night when I was a kid and my grandmother would make a birthday cake and me and my cousins would sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and blow out the candles. I admire that they stuck to that tradition simply because us kids were bombarded by presents every year and it was nice that they took the time to remind us why everyone there was celebrating and that it wasn't just about getting stuff. Now that I have a daughter I would like to expose her to the goodwill of the season and not just about Santa and the gifts (although, I'm sure we'll spoil her).
Yeah, no offense, but I think a more interesting question is why would a devout Christian incorporate the Easter Bunny. I think it's easier for us to attach meaning to this, the same way we do pumpkins and skeletons on Halloween, because we don't have to tie it in to any other ideology. I think it would actually be *harder* if you had to (or felt the need to) bring everything back to Christ.
Robin Williams does this great stand-up bit where he questions what the Easter bunny and hunting for eggs has to do with the crucifixion of Christ. He says instead of putting Easter eggs in the yard, why don't we spread some raspberry jam in the grass and say 'Hey kids, let's look for Jesus!' It's pretty funny (much more so when he says it).
Baby248 - ETA 1/10/13
As far as I know, the Easter Bunny has nothing to do with Easter. I'd agree it's more of a spring thing that got lumped in with Easter. I was just wondering if people who don't celebrate the religious aspects of Easter still do the bunny and baskets (akin to doing Santa/trees but not a nativity at Christmas). Or, if they do nothing at all. But, it makes sense to me that it would be a celebration of spring. I actually really like thinking of it that way.
And, just FYI, I wouldn't say I'm terribly religious. We don't go to church every week, and honestly, I haven't gone to church on holidays in a while, either. That said, I do believe the Christian teachings, say prayers each night, and believe in God. I'm just not familiar with many people who don't believe, and wanted to educate myself of others' thinking, celebrations and traditions. Thanks for helping me to understand.
Interesting. Thanks for posting
I've been thinking more about this since this post. I'm fairly certain that if I was raised Jewish, then I'd probably still celebrate the holidays that I enjoyed/found significant non-religious meaning. I only know practicing Jewish people, but I'm fairly certain (as a pp alluded to) that it is possible to be culturally Jewish but be atheist or agnostic or whatever. I wonder why there's not a Christian equivalent? Is it b/c Christianity was the "majority"?
Anywho, we celebrate spring complete with baskets of goodies (mostly b/c Easter has the best candy) and a big feast with ham & spring veggies. Sometimes I time our celebration with Easter b/c that's when hams go on sale or whatever but I'm thinking to switching it to the weekend closest to May 1st as that's the first (significant) day that it starts to feel like spring. On the "first day of spring" is still so cold usually! I don't expect to do much of the Easter bunny thing with Sprout. I suspect it's because my family's Easter traditions were more revolved around going to church and had few defined traditions overall. Easter never had that sense of wonder like xmas did for me.
I find the Robin Williams joke offensive.
As a Christian, I honestly can't give you a religiously linked explanation of why the Easter bunny visited me as a child, and why we dyed Easter eggs. It was just a tradition. While my family took part in these traditions, they were never the emphasis of Easter- we just did them for fun. Easter has become commercialized just like Christmas.
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