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Pastimes : Don't Ask Rambi -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rambi who wrote (57814)	12/27/2000 12:44:26 AM
From: epicure	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71178

There is a very good book about the Pagan aspects of the Christmas tree. And gift giving, on the massive scale Americans practice it, is NOT the kind of giving to the needy Jesus mentioned. You know what is really funny? To be in church with people who ask a whole congregation to pray for a real estate deal, or the financial well-being of a member of the congregation. Prayers for cancer, or calamity I can understand- but prayers for lucre? But this WAS a Baptist church- maybe they are different.

To: Rambi who wrote (57814)	12/27/2000 1:34:10 AM
From: JF Quinnelly	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 71178

Feelies is one vast wasteland of nonsense, and those Christmas harangues of CGB were prime examples. She largely drew from the likes of Piekoff, Infidelnet, and other sources with an axe to grind. It's always amusing to see 'pagan' sources treated without any scepticism by the same folks who subject church sources to complete doubt. I say subject the critics' sources to the same tests they like to use on other materials. It doesn't bother me if the church absorbs pagan holidays and converts them to its own use. It's a "so what?" issue. But there may be less to that borrowing than you assume. I'm interested in knowing truth, and what annoys me is the certainty that many of these critics are accorded with their own claims. Take something simple like the dating of Christ's birth. We hear that it certainly wasn't in December. And how is this known? There may be a dating clue in the gospel narrative. People familiar with the habits of shepherds claim to see it. There's also a dating clue based on John the Baptist's birth and the time of his father's religious duties. Apparently both point to a December birth. If so, it isn't surprising that Christian tradition would lead to absorbing a nearby, and major, pagan holiday.