Between the Lines: Christmas for Christians - and Jews, too?

Posted on December 13, 2012 |

• Opinion
• Between the Lines

By Gregory Dennis

Is Christmas a Christian holiday?

Maybe the people who keep urging us to put the Christ back in Christmas have a point. At a time when a growing number of Americans identify with no religious institution, we’ve lost much of the holiday’s religious value.

But many historians believe the historical Jesus was born in the spring. The timing and some of the rituals of modern-day Christmas (e.g., the tree hauled in from the forest) appropriate pagan, solstice celebrations for the purposes of the dominant religious paradigm of our time.

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