Christmas is celebrated to remember the birth of Jesus Christ, who Christians believe is the Son of God.
The name ‘Christmas’ comes from the Mass of Christ (or Jesus). A Mass service (which is sometimes called Communion or Eucharist) is where Christians remember that Jesus died and then came back to life. The ‘Christ-Mass’ service was the only one that was allowed to take place after sunset (and before sunrise the next day), so people had it at Midnight! So we get the name Christ-Mass, shortened to Christmas.
Christmas is now celebrated by people around the world, whether they are Christians or not. It’s a time when family and friends come together and remember the good things they have. People, and especially children, also like Christmas as it’s a time when you give and receive presents!
The Date of Christmas
No one knows the real birthday of Jesus! No date is given in the Bible, so why do we celebrate it on the 25th December? The early Christians certainly had many arguments as to when it should be celebrated! Also, the birth of Jesus probably didn’t happen in the year 1 but slightly earlier, somewhere between 2 BCE/BC and 7 BCE/BC, possibly in 4 BCE/BC.
The first recorded date of Christmas being celebrated on December 25th was in 336, during the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine. But it was not an official Roman state festival at this time.
However, there are many different traditions and theories as to why Christmas is celebrated on December 25th.
A very early Christian tradition said that the day when Mary was told that she would have a very special baby, Jesus (called the Annunciation) was on March 25th – and it’s still celebrated today on the 25th March. Nine months after the 25th March is the 25th December!
March 25th was also the day some early Christians thought the world had been made, and also the day that Jesus died on when he was an adult and they thought that Jesus was conceived and had died on the same day of the year. The date was chosen as it was near the March/Vernal Equinox (when the date and night are of equal length in March).
The Solstice, Yalda and Saturnalia
The Winter Solstice is the day where there is the shortest time between the sun rising and the sun setting. It happens on December 21st or 22nd in the Northern Hemisphere. (In the Southern Hemisphere, this time is the Summer Solstice and the Winter Solstice happens in late June.)
To pre-Christians/pagans this meant that they knew that the days would start getting lighter and longer and the nights would become shorter – marking a change in the seasons. To celebrate people had a mid-winter festival to celebrate the sun ‘winning’ over the darkness of winter. At this time, animals which had been kept for food were also often killed to save having to feed them all through the winter and some drinks which had been brewing since the autumn/harvest would also be ready to drink. So it was a good time to have a celebration with things to eat and drink before the rest of the winter happened. (We still have New Year celebrations near this time now!)
In Scandinavia, and some other parts of northern Europe, the time around the Winter Solstice is known as Yule (although the word Yule only seems to date to about the year 300). In Eastern Europe the mid-winter festival is called Koleda.