@Cmdr:
Santa Claus was Saint Nicholas, a Christian.
as far as i know its simply not true
Santa Claus first came up with communists, they couldnt stand still when christians celebrated Christmass so they offered alternative, some human which bring gifts instead of Little Jesus
then Coca-Cola accepted this for commercial reasons and popularized it all over the word
and coincidence or not as far as i know coca-cola owner, or majority shares holder is a Jew, and majority of Jews cant stand with Christmas or any other purely Christian or purely muslim or even ˝joint˝ holiday
in my country when its Saint Nicholases day( 6.of December ) the children receive gifts from a man wearing red-white clothes, with bishop hat, staff and priest cloak
its organized in schools, churches and little children clean and polish their boots and put before sleep and once they get up in the morning they find lots of sweets and some gifts( which their parents put there )
but Santa Claus( Granndpa Christmass )-translated from my language is purely antichristian product
in some big cities of Austria and Bavaria on Winter Markets in the center of the city, the Santa Claus is boicoted from sellers, and there are only˝Little Jesus˝ and other chrisitan figures, statues and sweets to be sold
please correct me if i am wrong
since i would like to understand this issue better
since this Santa( Saint ) confuses me a little bit
and speaking of paganity among Christians
there is no such in official things
Church has just adopted, or rearanged some customs of old and practices them today, for example ancient romans prayed to their Gods few times a year for a good harvest. Catholic Church( maybe Orthodox and protestant too i am dont know ) has few times in year when we pray to God to give us that our crops ˝go well˝ and that land gives us many fruits and at the same time we thank to God
-in Rome for example there is a church called Panteon-its an octogon( 8 sided shape ) which was in Roman times place where they ve done their paganic rituals, and prayed to their gods, today its a catholic church, and the building isnt changed at all, its just the altar is added and Tabernakul( place where the Corpus Christi is keped )
so the Church didnt want to sotonize the previous cultures, on the contrary the Church wants to adapt( some of the ) the customs of nations and cultures where it is present, for example in Africa they have little drums, and sing loudly( almost dance ) which isnt typical for Catholic liturgy of the West
when one Polish saint whent to Japan he was writing excellent articals in a magazine which he was owning, the articals were great but very emotional, one Japanese priest told him that Japanese are ˝tough˝ and not so lean to show emotions so they would like to hear about the same ˝Things˝ but in a different way
afcorse each of us is ˝his own˝ and doesnt need to renounce himself, but at the same time we should rescpect the customs and traditions of others…its just we need to mantain some how to say balance-i dont have the better word, in the same time respecting others as different in a diversity of traditions and cultures but still be your own
ok, i ve astrayed a bit here
all the best to everyone
˝Christmas is always
when a human child finds love,
motherly, fatherly home.
Christmas is always
when a man opens his legs and hands
for the people in need.
Christmas is always
when people forgive each other.˝
if i ve hurt anyone in anything here on this forum in i plead for forgiveness