This December, forget Christmas and party like a pagan
By JED LEVINE
U-Wire
I'm with Bill O'Reilly on this one. I'm tired of all this "Happy Holidays," politically correct mumbo jumbo. Everyone knows December is about one holiday and one holiday only - there's no need for plurals.
Yes, I'm talking about the time-honored pagan celebration of Yule.
All those pseudoholidays such as Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa have merely co-opted Yule, the hedonistic, alcoholic romp commemorating the winter solstice. I say we cut out the middlemen and get back to basics.
Contrary to popular belief, Jesus was not born on Dec. 25. One key giveaway would be the presence of shepherds at his birth. Shepherds don't usually go around with their flocks in the middle of winter.
Yes, Christmas - that quintessential Christian holiday - isn't really Christian after all. Early Christians had a hard time converting the pagans of Europe to their budding religion and had real trouble getting them to stop worshipping the earth and start worshipping the "Big J."
So what did they do? Well, they started by copying pagan holidays.
Late December was traditionally a time for celebrating the winter solstice with a lot of un-Christlike debauchery - drinking, orgies and the like.
The Romans were very fond of these traditions, and their solstice celebration, Saturnalia, was one of the most important and raucous events of the year.
So early Christians co-opted Yule and allowed new converts to continue their traditional practices - only now under the auspices of honoring Jesus' birthday. Pretty neat trick, huh?
But the Church couldn't completely erase Christmas' pagan roots. Some of them survive to this day.
Mistletoe is a Viking tradition. Christmas trees came from the druids. As for eggnog and fruitcake - well, nobody really seems to have an explanation for eggnog and fruitcake.
Christmas, it seems, is really just a load of reindeer crap.
The implication is clear. Christmas has started a landslide of consumerism and remorseless holiday cheer that will continue to drown out the more authentic and time-honored celebration of the winter solstice. What a travesty.
So this year, get drunk, sacrifice a pig and celebrate the solstice the old-fashioned way.
Jed Levine is a student at UCLA.
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