Christmas is a Christian holiday commemorating Jesus’ birth. Christmas, which originally meant “mass on Christ’s day,” is a relatively new term in English. The Anglo-Saxon geōl or the Germanic jōl, which denoted the feast of the winter solstice, may have been the source of the earlier term Yule. The same phrases in other languages, such as Noël in French, Natale in Italian, and Navidad in Spanish, most likely refer to nativity. Weihnachten means “hallowed night” in German. Christmas has also been a secular family holiday since the early 20th century, celebrated by both Christians and non-Christians, without any Christian overtones, and distinguished by an ever-more ornate gift-giving tradition. The main character in this secular Christmas celebration is a fictional person named Santa Claus.
Beginning and progress
What makes Christmas different from Yule?
What makes Christmas different from Yule?
One of the world’s oldest celebrations of the winter solstice is Yule.View every video related to this article
The early Christian church made a distinction between commemorating Jesus’ birthdate in liturgical celebrations and determining his exact date of birth. It took a while for the day of Jesus’ birth to be officially observed. Specifically, there was a lot of opposition to celebrating the birthdays of martyrs or even Jesus throughout the first two decades of Christianity. From the church’s perspective, many Church Fathers made sardonic remarks regarding the heathen practice of commemorating birthdays when, in reality, saints and martyrs ought to be honored on the days of their martyrdom—their actual “birthdays”