The dying of the light
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1245805,00.html
David McKie
Thursday June 24, 2004
The Guardian
The early Christian church had a talent for recycling second-hand
pagan feasts. The best-known case is Christmas, where the celebration
of Christ's birth was harmonised with that of the Roman festival of
the Unconquered Sun. By adopting these special days for their own
consumption, Christians could make it part of their sales pitch to
reassure waverers that converting to Christianity didn't mean giving
up all those lovely feast days. The traditional celebrations in
English homes - roistering, making the welkin ring, bringing flesh and
wine and pine logs hither, and so on - are direct descendants of Roman
practice.
David McKie
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