when is christ's b-day?

It is not proven by any fact that Christ was born on 12-25, It is the day that his birth is celebrated.

The Shepherds were living in the fields with their sheep, so it was certainly not winter, shepherds never kept their flocks and herds out in the open country from December through February because the weather was too cold
Luke 1:
8And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.

Also Rome was taking a census, which would also have not been done in the winter. Luke 2:1

Jesus was born in the Fall most likely September, because remember that Joseph was taking Mary to Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles, also Autumn is always the time of harvest... not Winter.

The interesting about December 25th, is that if you count from the Feast of Tabernacle forward 3 months.... Mary could have more than likely conceived our Lord, at about this time.

I hope this helps,
Phileo

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]***One book is The Oxford Guide to Ideas and Issues of the Bible (Bruce Metzger and Michael Coogan, editors, 2001). In its entry "Christmas," this source reports: "Twenty-five December was by the fourth century [A.D.] the date of the winter solstice, celebrated in antiquity as the birthday of Mithras [an ancient Persian god] and of Sol Invictus [the ‘unconquered’ sun god]. In the Julian calendar the solstice fell on 6 January, when the birthday of Osiris [the Egyptian god of the dead] was celebrated at Alexandria. By about 300 CE [A.D.], 6 January was the date of the Epiphany in the East, a feast always closely related to Christmas[/font][font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif].[/font]

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]"The earliest mention of 25 December for Christmas is in the Philocalian Calendar of 354, part of which reflects Roman practice in 336. Celebration of Christ’s birthday was not general until the fourth century; in fact, as late as the fifth century the Old Armenian Lectionary of Jerusalem still commemorated James and David on 25 December, noting ‘in other towns they keep the birth of Christ’" (p. 95, emphasis added).[/font]

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Modern Christians should be shocked that as late as the mid-fourth century not all Christians had yet begun celebrating the pagan festivals of Christmas and New Year’s. The Oxford Guide also notes that Christmas has its roots in the winter solstice, celebrated anciently as the birthday of the sun and the Persian deity Mithras.[/font]

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Sir James George Frazer wrote a well-researched book on Christian holidays, The Golden Bough. He expands on the origin of Christmas as the birthday of the ancient Persian god Mithras: "... There can be no doubt that the Mithraic religion proved a formidable rival to Christianity, combining as it did a solemn ritual with aspirations after moral purity and a hope of immortality. Indeed the issue of the conflict between the two faiths appears for a time to have hung in the balance. An instructive relic of the long struggle is preserved in our festival of Christmas, which the Church seems to have borrowed directly from its heathen rival.[/font]

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]"In the Julian calendar the twenty-fifth of December was reckoned the winter solstice, and it was regarded as the Nativity of the Sun, because the day begins to lengthen and the power of the sun to increase from that turning-point of the year. The ritual of the nativity, as it appears to have been celebrated in Syria and Egypt, was remarkable. The celebrants retired into certain inner shrines, from which at midnight they issued with a loud cry, ‘The Virgin has brought forth! The light is waxing!’[/font]

[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Like many good researchers, Sir James Frazer followed the thread of Christmas through historical records and came up with one inescapable conclusion: Christmas is but a relic of the worship of a pagan god known by the Persians as Mithra or Mithras. In other words, those who observe Christmas today simply keep an ancient idolatrous holiday season dressed in Christian symbolism![/font][font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]***[/font]

Read more on this article at: ucg.org/gn/gn43/xmas.htm

I find nothing wrong with celebratring the fact that the Savior was born on any given day... why not on Dec 25th. I rather see people celebrate the Birth of the True God Almighty Immanuel, than so mythic God called Mithra on every possible occasion including 12/25.


I have never told my kids the Santa myth either the name santa to me is an acronym for satan.


Yet we do celebrate the holiday. I have taught my children that their gift giving signifies that God's gift to us was eternal life in Christ.

The Tree reminds us that through the Gift of God's Son we have now a right to the Tree of Life.

The Lights to remind us that Jesus is the Light of the World
___________________

The rest I explain to them as commercialism and captilism, which has nothing to do with Christ and everything to do with your MasterCard.

When we need answers God will provide

Rather than looking to secular sources of information on a Christian celebration, might I suggest looking at what the Church (who after all, through the Holy Spirit, ordained the feast) says about The Feast of the Nativity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ

What most people seem to forget is that all of us were pagans before we were Christians, worshiping our own gods, idols, and flesh. Christ freed us from that, teaching us to love and adore Him and our fellow man instead. As the Troparion (Hymn) below shows, it was a star (that was in the past worshipped) that led the way to He who is to be adored. Likewise, God uses that which was in the past unclean, as a way to Him who makes all things pure and new again.


Your Nativity, O Christ our God,
Has shone to the world the Light of wisdom!
For by it, those who worshipped the stars,
Were taught by a Star to adore You,
The Sun of Righteousness,
And to know You, the Orient from on High.
O Lord, glory to You!

First Let me state that Good News Magazine is not secular, and then I think I added scriptures to disprove a winter birth.

Here is what New Life says ....New Life also Not secular:

The celebration of Christ's birth in the the early church

In the first 200 years of Christian history, no mention is made of the calendar date of Jesus' birth. Not until the year 336 do we find the first mention of a celebration of His birth.

Why this omission? In the case of the Church fathers, the reason is that, during the three centuries after Christ's life on earth, the event considered most worthy of commemoration was the date of His death. In comparison, the date of His birth was considered insignificant. As the Encyclopedia Americana explains, "Christmas... was, according to many authorities, not celebrated in the first centuries of the Christian church, as the Christian usage in general was to celebrate the death of remarkable persons rather than their birth..." (1944 edition, "Christmas").

Speculation on the proper date began in the 3rd and 4th centuries, when the idea of fixing Christ's birthday started. Quite a controversy arose among Church leaders. Some were opposed to such a celebration. Origen (185-254) strongly recommended against such an innovation. "In the Scriptures, no one is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday. It is only sinners who make great rejoicings over the day in which they were born into this world" (Catholic Encyclopedia, 1908 edition, Vol. 3, p. 724, "Natal Day").

During this time eight specific dates during six different months were proposed by various groups. December 25, although one of the last dates to be proposed, was the one finally accepted by the leadership of the Western church.

A summary of the debate on the dates of Christ's birth appears in The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church: "Though speculation as to the time of year of Christ's birth dates from the early 3rd century, Clement of Alexandria suggesting the 20th of May, the celebration of the anniversary does not appear to have been general till the later 4th century. The earliest mention of the observance on Dec. 25th is in the Philocalian Calendar, representing Roman practice of the year 336. This date was probably chosen to oppose the feast of the Natalis Solis Invicti [nativity of the unconquerable sun] by the celebration of the birth of the 'Sun of Righteousness' and its observance in the West, seems to have spread from Rome" (1983 edition, Oxford University Press, New York, 1983, p. 280, "Christmas").

Around 200, when Clement of Alexandria mentioned the speculations about Christ's birthday, he said nothing about a celebration on that day. He casually reported the various ideas extant at that time: "And there are those who have determined not only the year of our Lord's birth, but also the day..., the 25th day of Pachon... Furthermore, others say that He was born on the 24th or 25th of Pharmuthi" ("The Stromata, or Miscellanies," The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 2, Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1986, p. 333).

Later, in 243, the official feast calendar of the time, De Pascha Computus, places the date of Christ's birth as March 28. Other dates suggested were April 2 and November 18. Meanwhile, in the East, January 6 was chosen, a date the Greeks had celebrated as the birth of the god Dionysus and the Egyptians as the birth of the god Osiris. Although pagans commonly celebrated the birthdays of their gods, in the Bible a birthday is never celebrated to the true God (who, of course, had no birth or day of origin).

Also the Church may have indeed ordained this feast, and I have no problem with that. Yet we are speaking of Scriptural Feast Commanded by God, Such as Tabernacles, Passover, Day of Atonement etc...

No Christmas or Easter though. As far as any type of feast regarding the Death and Ressurection Of Christ... He merely said, "As often as you do this, do it in memory of me.

Yet As stated before, I have nothing against celebrating these feast as long as it edifies Christ.

Bunnies, santa, eggs stocking and hallmark, do not edify. (sorry but that's my opinion and I am sticking by it)

Yet we are speaking of Scriptural Feast Commanded by God
.
.
.
No Christmas or Easter though. As far as any type of feast regarding the Death and Ressurection Of Christ... He merely said, "As often as you do this, do it in memory of me.

Click to expand...

God speaks through His Church and is not limited to Scripture.

Bunnies, santa, eggs stocking and hallmark, do not edify.

Click to expand...

Agreed. You will not find secular Western Madison Ave things in the Orthodox Church. Eggs however are quite Christian, they signify the rebirth and the new Creation from death, the new Adam that was reborn on Pascha.

Oblio,

Let us just agree to disagree, in an agreeable Christlike fashion.

Obviously you have a religion that you believe in and I commend you for standing by that.

I am not a religious person and therefore, I rarely embrace those thing sanctioned and ordained by Churches.

I am probably what you would term a Spiritual Believer, and I seek Spiritual truth and Wisdom, I tend to be pretty indifferent on the religious traditions.

No offense but that's just me.

When we need answers God will provide

from what I have been told , JC's b-day is actually in late summer .... not 12-25 ; the reason we celebrate 12-25 is to cover the pagan festival you mentioned & perhaps to kick it up a couple of notches in the dreary winter ..... hope in the midst of cold , dark , and death ...

Fair enough Phileo

May God guide you and keep you !

In IC XC

- Oblio

Phileo said:

It is not proven by any fact that Christ was born on 12-25, It is the day that his birth is celebrated.

The Shepherds were living in the fields with their sheep, so it was certainly not winter, shepherds never kept their flocks and herds out in the open country from December through February because the weather was too cold
Luke 1:
8And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.

Also Rome was taking a census, which would also have not been done in the winter. Luke 2:1

Jesus was born in the Fall most likely September, because remember that Joseph was taking Mary to Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles, also Autumn is always the time of harvest... not Winter.

The interesting about December 25th, is that if you count from the Feast of Tabernacle forward 3 months.... Mary could have more than likely conceived our Lord, at about this time.

I hope this helps,
Phileo

Click to expand...

Phileo, I have heard this statement about the temperatures before and quite frankly believe it to be a myth. The average high temperature in Jerusalem in January is 53 and the average low is 39. Sheep stay out in much colder temperatures than this. This is no reason to stay in when you need to watch your flocks.

Paul Maier has a new book, "The First Christmas: The True and Unfamiliar Story of Christ's Birth", which addresses this and other issues surrounding the Nativity.

if you believe the shepherds stayed out in the fields tending sheep on a 39 degree night, can you explain the feast of tabernacles, the harvest feast, and the census?

who was santa http://users.rcn.com/tlclcms/santa.htm