Twelve Days of Christmas: Day One - Christmas Day

Nowadays, December 25th is regarded as the traditional date of Christ’s birth, and therefore we celebrate it as such. It is, of course, not the actual date of His birth - there are no records that show the actual date. But why was December 25th chosen?

Early on, there was a great deal of debate concerning whether or not the birth of Christ should be celebrated at all. It was the way pagan kings were honored and many church leaders thought that it would be wrong to treat the Lord in the same manner. Those that did celebrate His birth chose a multitude of dates to recognise it, from Epiphany (January 6th) to just about any given date in the Spring, all for various reasons.

Choosing the date of December 25th was an extremely controversial decision because it was already an important date for pagan deities. On the ancient Roman calender, the 25th was the winter solstice. Since this was the day that daylight began to increase, it was celebrated by Romans as the “birth of the unconquered sun” and was also considered the birthday of Mithras, the Iranian sun god. In an apparent attempt to make these pagan holidays holy, the Christian church began to observe the birth of their Lord on that day.

In 336, Emperor Constantine declared Christmas (or Christ’s Mass) the major holiday for Christianity. Although the Eastern church still celebrated it on January 6th, most conformed to the new traditional date of the 25th of December. These days, most Western churches consider January 6th to be the date of the Magi’s arrival in Bethlehem.