Season's Greetings

From: Beth (BethStone21_at_hotmail.NOSPICEDHAM.com)
Date: 12/24/03 

Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 10:39:52 -0000

Hi :)

    Just posting to wish everyone Merry Mid-winter Festivities and
Joyous New Calendar Celebrations...

[ Which translates to "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" for
Westernised Christians but you can also take it as "Happy Divali" or
"Merry Luminos" and so forth, if you like, because most cultures have
some sort of "mid-winter festival"...after all, the Christian
"Christmas" is actually the original Pagan "let's tempt the Sun back
for next spring" festival with Christ's nativity story attached (the
December 25th date "usurped" for Christmas because no-one really knows
what day Christ was born on, so it just sort of got "attached" onto a
pagan festival that was already going, which was about trying to tempt
the Sun back into the sky or something like that...so that it would
come back after winter was over ;)...giving gifts is about Saint
Nicholas (a saint _because_ he did this so there's nothing
particularly originally "Christian" about it...but it was just
considered a "good idea" that the Christians "approved" of it with
sainthood ;), "yule logs", mistletoe and so forth are all pagan, the
Christmas tree a Germanic tradition, etc. (heck, Santa Claus wearing
red is actually thanks to the _Coca-cola company_, as he was wearing
often seen wearing green in tradition until they got in on the act
and - *ahem* - made him wear the "company colours", as a sort of
subconscious advertising gimmick ;)...only the nativity story is
_really_ "Christian"...the rest is up for grabs for any beliefs, if
you like...it's all "commercial" these days, anyhow...though,
Birmingham City Council probably were going a bit too far in deciding
to rename Christmas as "Luminos" - festival of light (if there's
copyright on "Divali" then I urge you to sue ;) - but the spirit and
heart's in roughly the right place..."goodwill to all" and "peace" and
such ;) ]

"Silent night, Holy night,
All is calm, all is bright...
Round yon Virgin Mother and Child,
Holy Infant so tender and mild,
Sleep in Heavenly Peace...
Sleep in Heavenly Peace..."

[ "Silent Night", traditional :) ]

Beth :)

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