Friday, March 5, 2010
Christmas and Easter
Christmas and Easter are extremely important holidays in the Christian community; one holiday celebrates the birth of Christ and the other celebrates the rising of Christ from the dead. Therefore, it is not ironic that more people attend church around these two holidays than any other time throughout the year. You do not need to go to church every Sunday to consider yourself a Christian. However, attending church should still be a part of your life. Communion, the receiving of Christ, still needs to be obtained. Plus a sermon every once and a while never hurt anyone. Sermons can seem boring to some people or they can be the highlight to the day for other people. There are also people that read the Bible but do not fully understand what is being said, and a sermon can help to reinforce the message of the Bible. This is why you do not need to go to church every Sunday, however church should still be apart of your life.
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Christmas and Easter are two times of the the year that are supposed to be spent not only with family but also are supposed to be spent in the presence of God. Like I said in my post, because of the importance of these two holidays, it is not ironic that the attendance in church is much higher around these two times of year. Just because these are two very important holidays, however, does not mean that you should only go to church on these two dates. The Bible does not say that Christians should even celebrate Christmas, but it has been celebrated since the 4th Century. Today's society, however, has taken away what the meaning of Christmas is truly all about. Yes Christmas is a season of giving and being with family and friends, but people today, as quoted by Brian Lewis, "spend more time at Wal-Mart and less time at church."
ReplyDeleteWorks Cited
Brian Lewis.
"Should a Christian Celebrate Christmas?." 11/2002. Biblical Discernment Ministries, Web. 6 Feb 2010.
Christianity has influenced Australian culture immensely and is the religion that most Australians belong to. In fact, Christmas and Easter are considered to be major national holidays. However, "the population with a religion other than Christianity hovers around 5 and 6 percent." (Frame) The country of Australia is slowly becoming like the United States of America, many different religions living together in one area of land. Australia has been "creeping towards the American custom" of saying "Happy Holidays" so as to not offend anyone. However, because of the many different religions coming together, saying "Happy Holidays" is not necessarily a bad thing because many religions have a holiday around Christian's observance of Christmas. Easter, however, is more of a religious observance than Christmas. Easter has more of a religious observance than Christmas because of the fact that Easter celebrates the rising of Jesus Christ, Whereas Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ.
ReplyDeleteI do understand that followers of religions outside of Christianity would argue that this is unfair and unjust. But the fact of the matter is this, Australia and the United States can, and will, keep these three Christian Holy Day's as paid holidays. It is entirely up to each individual nation to decide what can and cannot be considered paid holidays.
Works Cited
Frame, Tom. "The future of Easter in a secular society." Quadrant Mar. 2008:68+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 8 Feb. 2010.
However, many followers of Christianity have taken too much advantage of Easter. Some Christians have used Easter the same way they use Christmas, another excuse to spoil your family and friends. This is not the purpose of either of these holidays. Yes, Christians should be thankful for what Jesus Christ sacrificed so that his followers could have better lives and should be proud of this. But where is the line drawn in the sand between being thankful and losing sight of why these holidays are celebrated? As children, we are naive and think of these holidays of a time of the year to receive presents and candy, but at the same time are told about the importance; however, the presents and candy receive more emphasis. The question is always, "What would you like for Christmas?" and not "Why do we celebrate Christmas?"
ReplyDeleteI found this post to be very interesting, especially in your last part comment, where you mention that we have come to a time where we no longer think about why we are doing something and we just do it. The fact is that more emphasis should be placed on why we are celebrating these holidays and why they care considered to be "paid" holidays. Even though so many people are just looking forward to having the day off, and getting paid for it. In all reality, these holidays are "paid" holidays because they are a time to look back and think about why they are important. More people should think outside the box and stop thinking about their wallet all the time.
ReplyDeleteI won't argue the importance of these two holidays. As you said, Christ dying for our sins and then being raised back to life are the very basis for the Christian faith. The point I want to make is that, God’s tremendous gift to us – giving his son to be brutally killed – deserves an extreme response on our part. Let's say you have a dog that you love so much you would do anything for it, but it keeps attacking the neighbors. The only choice you have is to kill it, unless there can be some substitution for the penalty. You decide that you will send the person you love most in this life - knowing that, after experiencing immeasurable pain, he or she will live again. After this is all done, wouldn’t you be pretty let down if your dog no longer wished to play with you and be with you? In fact, if that dog acted up even one more time in its entire life you would be extremely upset based on the suffering that was endured for it. Obviously you can see the parallel I use to show God's sacrifice for us. Really, the point of this whole life is that God loves people and wants to have a real relationship with them. He was willing to pay a tremendous price, and that should stimulate a big response.
ReplyDeleteThe video posted on my thesis further stresses the point I’m making. Christians absolutely need to get their minds wrapped around this and start living what they believe. If you don’t have a long enough attention span, at least watch the second half of this, but the entire video illustrates what the Christian life is.
I would just like to strongly express the fact that an individual’s relationship with God is going to be a personal one. Therefore, it doesn't make sense to have to publicly show the relationship you do have. One person might attend Church every Sunday and go to Bible study every Wednesday, as well. The other prays when they are alone or with close family, and doesn't participate in organized religion. How does being in the presence of Church change the relationship that God has with you? God is also known for being forgiving, not everyone is comfortable with sharing their beliefs with the whole community. They would rather do things on their own time and how they want to do it. I want to emphasize that even another aspect of being a true Christian is to not show any bias to others based on their belief and how they practice it. Therefore, if one who believes that you have to go to Church every Sunday routinely is showing any kind of bias, rather it is feeling they are better than the other or if they think that they are not a true Christian, they are also being sinful and are acting in a way that is not what a TRUE Christian is supposed to do.
ReplyDeleteI am glad that you asked the question, "How does the being in the presence of church change the relationship that God has with you?" The idea of attending church has been largely converted into a "guilt-trip", trying to convince professing Christians that they need to attend to be a "good" Christian. If church is about God, and God is about a personal relationship with us, then the reality is that God isn't about us to coming to church if we don't want to. No one wants to hang out with someone that doesn't want to be with him or her. We want to hang out with people that want to be with us. When we commit to a close relationship with our Creator, it serves to reason that we are going to WANT to learn more about Him so that we can draw even closer to Him.
ReplyDeleteTo address your statement that Christians shouldn't "show any bias to others based on belief and how they practice it", I would agree, to an extent. Christians believe that everyone is equal before God in that we are all undeserving of God's love; however, once a Christian reaches a point in faith where it becomes certain that this faith is "truth", isn't it a grave disservice, and extremely greedy to not present others with an opportunity to join? I certainly don't endorse ramming religion down anyone’s throat; however, a Christian should be capable of a civil discussion regarding their faith.
Again, i stress that Christians cannot know what they believe without studying the Bible to find out what their religion is about. Without Biblical study, one isn't challenged to respond to the Bible's instructions on radical living. Casually claiming Christianity, while living like everyone else doesn't impress anyone.