Here we go again
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enfieldwhite
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When I say 'share' I mean in the form of gentle encouragement and support. I will not, also, be partaking of a month's fasting during the hours of daylight and going to Mosque five times a day with my Muslim friends during Ramadan. Conversely, I will not be pouring alcohol down my (tee-total) friend's neck's during my festive period.David Lee's Hair wrote:I'm with you two here completely. I have great friends of all religions and beliefs, and in all cases they are genuinely nice people who are happy to explain there beliefs, and my arguements for not believing. Hence the rotten apples arguement before.enfieldwhite wrote:TANGODANCER wrote:Just touching lightly (very lightly) on Mummy's posts from the Muslim cases:
For a couple of years I've travelled home from work with a young Muslim girl. Just got to know each other from causally standing in the same queues nightly. Lovely girl, dazzlingly attractive even though she dresses full Muslim style with her head covered and she's quite willing to talk openly about religion; she's been once on the Mecca Pilgrimage and wants to go again. We've discussed things like Christmas and her festivals and many other topics with mutual interest. She's twenty six and single, rather rare in her world but feels she will have an arranged marriage before too long (although she doesn't seem overly anxious for this to happen). Despite the age difference this is a person I much admire and am comfortable with. We sit together, walk together and even have shared an umbrella together in the rain. At least, sadly that is, until last week when her firm moved offices and she now catches a different train. I really hope I still see her occasionally.
Point is, she's tee-total, doesn't go clubbing or even out much at weekends, except to family weddings etc, and after a days work and travelling to work and home from Bolton to Manchester and back, her family wait for her to get home and cook for five of them. She just laughs wryly at my amazement at this, but is it from choice, religious belief or just from family arrogance and a skewed view on life in the millennium in England? Wouldn't dream of going on about this or calling her family, but I jokingly tell her she wants to put her foot down somewhere (preferably up someone's lazy ass). There are some aspects of Muslim life that I feel have little to do with the Koran and more to do with social class distinction.. Hard to believe in 2006.
From my time in London (17 years) I have encountered many different people with many different faiths. All have been accepting of my questions about their beliefs and all have been happy to share their thoughts on the similarities and differences in our religions.
I am a Roman-Catholic, my wife is CofE, as is my daughter. We have friends who are Muslim, Jewish, Hindu and Sikh and I embrace them all.
I feel compelled to append this to TD's post, and I know it's away from the main thrust of the thread, but my friends will share the festivities at my house at Christmas, as I will theirs at Ramadan, Yom Kippur, Diwali, Rosh Hashanna, etc. etc.
One disagreement EW though, I wouldn't want to share Yom Kippur. 26 hours of fasting, not being able to clean your teeth, uses electricity, and 12 hours in Synagogue repenting for my sins aint my idea of fun!
"You're Gemini, and I don't know which one I like the most!"
mummywhycantieatcrayons wrote:Surely this has been obvious for quite some time?!thebish wrote:maybe this is where we're going awry - we mean different things by "Pagan"? I don't class Roman "religion" as "Pagan" - you obviously do..
indeed - but I like my bone, and (believe it or not) I'm a stubborn old git!
anyway - back to stamps...
here's some stamps we'd all be proud to lick....
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Raven
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First let me correct what I put, I did not mean all traditions but most and certainly did not want to insult anyones belief, each to their own for me. I will admit dinner was on the table so typed my bit in a rush 
Here's what I have when this discussion came up at work
"Many of our modern Christmas traditions began hundreds of years before Christ was born. Some of these traditions date back more than 4000 years. Ancient Midwinter festivities celebrated the return of the Sun from cold and darkness. Midwinter was a turning point between the Old Year and the New Year. Fire was a symbol of hope and boughs of greenery symbolized the eternal cycle of creation. The addition of Christ to the celebration of the winter solstice did not occur until 300 years after Christ died and as late as 1800, some devout Christian sects, like the Puritans, forbade their members from celebrating Christmas because it was considered a pagan holiday. So what is the history behind these traditions?
The Christmas tree is derived from several solstice traditions. The Romans decked their halls with garlands of laurel and placed candles in live trees to decorate for the celebration of Saturnalia. In Scandinavia during the winter months, the Sun would disappear for great lengths of time. After thirty-five of such dark days, scouts would be dispatched to the mountain tops to await the return of this life-giving heavenly body. When the first light was espied, the scouts would hurry back to their villages bearing the good news. In celebration, a great festival would be held, called the Yuletide, and a special feast would be served around a fire burning with the Yule log, the log was the centre of the trunk of a tree that was dragged to a large fireplace where it was supposed to burn for twelve days. From this comes the twelve days of Christmas. In some areas, people would tie apples to the branches of trees as a reminder that Spring and Summer would eventually return. The evergreen tree was the special plant of their sun god, Baldor.
The practice of exchanging gifts at a winter celebration is also pre-Christian and is from the Roman Saturnalia. They would exchange good-luck gifts called Stenae (lucky fruits). They also would have a big feast just like we do today.
Mistletoe is from an ancient Druid custom at the winter solstice. Mistletoe was considered a divine plant and it symbolized love and peace. The tradition of kissing under the mistletoe is Druid in origin.
Even the date of Christmas, December 25, was borrowed from another religion. At the time Christmas was created in AD 320, Mithraism was very popular. The early Christian church had gotten tired of their futile efforts to stop people celebrating the solstice and the birthday of Mithras, the Persian sun god. Mithras’ birthday was December 25. So the pope at the time decided to make Jesus’ official birthday coincide with Mithras’ birthday. No one knows what time of year Jesus was actually, there is neither scriptural nor secular evidence to establish the exact moment. One thing is relatively certain, however, the event did not take place in December. Since the child was born when shepherds were "abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night" (Luke 2:8), it is unlikely that shepherds in Israel would have been sleeping outside with their flocks during the month of December. In Winter, the herders would have led their sheep outside only during the daylight hours...the nights would have been far too cold
So, if you are celebrating any of the western traditions of Christmas this year, remember that you are actually enjoying the rituals and activities of several ancient religions whose traditions have been borrowed by the Christians over the years for the celebration of the birth of Christ"
Here's what I have when this discussion came up at work"Many of our modern Christmas traditions began hundreds of years before Christ was born. Some of these traditions date back more than 4000 years. Ancient Midwinter festivities celebrated the return of the Sun from cold and darkness. Midwinter was a turning point between the Old Year and the New Year. Fire was a symbol of hope and boughs of greenery symbolized the eternal cycle of creation. The addition of Christ to the celebration of the winter solstice did not occur until 300 years after Christ died and as late as 1800, some devout Christian sects, like the Puritans, forbade their members from celebrating Christmas because it was considered a pagan holiday. So what is the history behind these traditions?
The Christmas tree is derived from several solstice traditions. The Romans decked their halls with garlands of laurel and placed candles in live trees to decorate for the celebration of Saturnalia. In Scandinavia during the winter months, the Sun would disappear for great lengths of time. After thirty-five of such dark days, scouts would be dispatched to the mountain tops to await the return of this life-giving heavenly body. When the first light was espied, the scouts would hurry back to their villages bearing the good news. In celebration, a great festival would be held, called the Yuletide, and a special feast would be served around a fire burning with the Yule log, the log was the centre of the trunk of a tree that was dragged to a large fireplace where it was supposed to burn for twelve days. From this comes the twelve days of Christmas. In some areas, people would tie apples to the branches of trees as a reminder that Spring and Summer would eventually return. The evergreen tree was the special plant of their sun god, Baldor.
The practice of exchanging gifts at a winter celebration is also pre-Christian and is from the Roman Saturnalia. They would exchange good-luck gifts called Stenae (lucky fruits). They also would have a big feast just like we do today.
Mistletoe is from an ancient Druid custom at the winter solstice. Mistletoe was considered a divine plant and it symbolized love and peace. The tradition of kissing under the mistletoe is Druid in origin.
Even the date of Christmas, December 25, was borrowed from another religion. At the time Christmas was created in AD 320, Mithraism was very popular. The early Christian church had gotten tired of their futile efforts to stop people celebrating the solstice and the birthday of Mithras, the Persian sun god. Mithras’ birthday was December 25. So the pope at the time decided to make Jesus’ official birthday coincide with Mithras’ birthday. No one knows what time of year Jesus was actually, there is neither scriptural nor secular evidence to establish the exact moment. One thing is relatively certain, however, the event did not take place in December. Since the child was born when shepherds were "abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night" (Luke 2:8), it is unlikely that shepherds in Israel would have been sleeping outside with their flocks during the month of December. In Winter, the herders would have led their sheep outside only during the daylight hours...the nights would have been far too cold
So, if you are celebrating any of the western traditions of Christmas this year, remember that you are actually enjoying the rituals and activities of several ancient religions whose traditions have been borrowed by the Christians over the years for the celebration of the birth of Christ"
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TANGODANCER
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Read everything with interest and it seems simple enough:
Christians decided to celebrate the birth of Christ during the same period as others. No one ever claimed they invented the feasting, celebrations, holly, mistletoe, yule logs or wearing party hats. The word "Christmas" is one they named to do just what it says, celebrate the arrival of the pillar of the Christian religion, Jesus Christ. The fact that other celebrations are in action at the same time, and the whole thing has melded together on December the 25th, is no real cause for anyone's alarm. It's only in recent times that all the hoo-haa has arisen due to the fact that some people suddenly want to obliterate the word "Christmas" in favour of other nefarious terms such as "Winter Celebration" etc. Why? No one object to the various days of celebration of other religions, whatever time of year they fall on. Why do it about Christianity?
Over nine million people share my birthdate of 14th of September. I don't claim it as my day except at home, but no one objects to me calling it my birthday...because it's a fact, just as Christmas is Christ's birthday. Bit of a difference in importance, but the same principle. Celebrate it as you will and we'll do the same. And to hell with the Royal Mail! Let them put important things on stamps, like snowmen.
Christians decided to celebrate the birth of Christ during the same period as others. No one ever claimed they invented the feasting, celebrations, holly, mistletoe, yule logs or wearing party hats. The word "Christmas" is one they named to do just what it says, celebrate the arrival of the pillar of the Christian religion, Jesus Christ. The fact that other celebrations are in action at the same time, and the whole thing has melded together on December the 25th, is no real cause for anyone's alarm. It's only in recent times that all the hoo-haa has arisen due to the fact that some people suddenly want to obliterate the word "Christmas" in favour of other nefarious terms such as "Winter Celebration" etc. Why? No one object to the various days of celebration of other religions, whatever time of year they fall on. Why do it about Christianity?
Over nine million people share my birthdate of 14th of September. I don't claim it as my day except at home, but no one objects to me calling it my birthday...because it's a fact, just as Christmas is Christ's birthday. Bit of a difference in importance, but the same principle. Celebrate it as you will and we'll do the same. And to hell with the Royal Mail! Let them put important things on stamps, like snowmen.
Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos?
Oooooh how great!!!!thebish wrote:mummywhycantieatcrayons wrote:Surely this has been obvious for quite some time?!thebish wrote:maybe this is where we're going awry - we mean different things by "Pagan"? I don't class Roman "religion" as "Pagan" - you obviously do..
indeed - but I like my bone, and (believe it or not) I'm a stubborn old git!
anyway - back to stamps...
here's some stamps we'd all be proud to lick....
I'd love to be able to lick my own stamp!!!!!!
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TANGODANCER
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[quote="Raven"] So, if you are celebrating any of the western traditions of Christmas this year, remember that you are actually enjoying the rituals and activities of several ancient religions whose traditions have been borrowed by the Christians over the years for the celebration of the birth of Christ"[/quote].
No, no,no Raven. I agree with your post's facts about the period, but the Chritians didn't borrow anything. It all just happens at the same time as my last post explains. Facts are getting scrambled here: The three wise men brought gifts of gold,frankincence and myrrh as gifts to a new born king, not as Christmas presents in the sense of Toys R-Us. Christmas happens at the same time as present giving so they are known as Christmas presents. Easter eggs happen at Easter but have nothing to do with the Easter of Christianity. If people have their way, one day the word may disappear in favour of some fancy alternative (as xmas is already a flat denial of God) . It will always be "Christmas" (the birth of Christ) to Christians the world over..
No, no,no Raven. I agree with your post's facts about the period, but the Chritians didn't borrow anything. It all just happens at the same time as my last post explains. Facts are getting scrambled here: The three wise men brought gifts of gold,frankincence and myrrh as gifts to a new born king, not as Christmas presents in the sense of Toys R-Us. Christmas happens at the same time as present giving so they are known as Christmas presents. Easter eggs happen at Easter but have nothing to do with the Easter of Christianity. If people have their way, one day the word may disappear in favour of some fancy alternative (as xmas is already a flat denial of God) . It will always be "Christmas" (the birth of Christ) to Christians the world over..
Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos?
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mummywhycantieatcrayons
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Well that would be a spectacle.Gertie wrote:
Oooooh how great!!!!
I'd love to be able to lick my own stamp!!!!!!
Good work Bish, how did you make those?
Prufrock wrote: Like money hasn't always talked. You might not like it, or disagree, but it's the truth. It's a basic incentive, people always have, and always will want what's best for themselves and their families
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CrazyHorse
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I didn't - you can generate them heremummywhycantieatcrayons wrote:Well that would be a spectacle.Gertie wrote:
Oooooh how great!!!!
I'd love to be able to lick my own stamp!!!!!!
Good work Bish, how did you make those?
http://www.stampitout.wildjelly.com/do.html
- a whole morning of awesome time-wasting fun... it even made me put my bone down - (but I think Tango has picked it up!!)
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communistworkethic
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why just this religion??? Doesn't that sum them all up?mummywhycantieatcrayons wrote:
And I'll answer my own question that I asked a while back - I would not like to use this stamp (that I associate with a violent, sexist, anachronistic religion) that was made in the USA in early 2001:
power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely
kevin nolan is so fat, that when he sits around the house he sits around the house
kevin nolan is so fat, that when he sits around the house he sits around the house
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TANGODANCER
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Raven
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Oh I'm quite happy for christians or anyone to use any day they like doesn't bother me, I was just previously interested in some of the customs and where they came from, most of which at lot of people think are all to do with celebrating Christmas as the birth of Christ, when in fact a lot of the traditions (and the day) predates this.
Me I don't care what anyone celebrates, as long as they don't preach at me or preach intolerance etc, live and let live is my motto which does not seem to apply to a lot of people these day quite a few who use religion as an excuse for intolerance and hate.
Me I don't care what anyone celebrates, as long as they don't preach at me or preach intolerance etc, live and let live is my motto which does not seem to apply to a lot of people these day quite a few who use religion as an excuse for intolerance and hate.
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TANGODANCER
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Far better a Godless, anarchaic world hey?communistworkethic wrote:why just this religion??? Doesn't that sum them all up?mummywhycantieatcrayons wrote:
And I'll answer my own question that I asked a while back - I would not like to use this stamp (that I associate with a violent, sexist, anachronistic religion) that was made in the USA in early 2001:
Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos?
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mummywhycantieatcrayons
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communistworkethic
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why does no religion = anarchy? Is China anarchy? Was USSR anarchy? Take the flawed economics out of the equation, both are non-religion based societies neither was anarchy.
power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely
kevin nolan is so fat, that when he sits around the house he sits around the house
kevin nolan is so fat, that when he sits around the house he sits around the house
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TANGODANCER
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TANGODANCER
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Bhuddism, Russian Orthodox, Chritianity, Judasim and Islam in both? How are they non-religion based?communistworkethic wrote:why does no religion = anarchy? Is China anarchy? Was USSR anarchy? Take the flawed economics out of the equation, both are non-religion based societies neither was anarchy.
Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos?
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mummywhycantieatcrayons
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So you are making the argument for religion, any religion, as an instrument of social control now Tango?
Prufrock wrote: Like money hasn't always talked. You might not like it, or disagree, but it's the truth. It's a basic incentive, people always have, and always will want what's best for themselves and their families
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