Answer: Dear Diana,

You might want to consider a few extra thoughts that would modify/clarify your statement below:

1. I was surprised by what your dictionary said, for if that definition is correct, no pagans could have existed before the civilizations of Greece and Rome. That would mean that the commandment you cited (Ex. 20:3) was not relevant until Greece and Rome, but of course, history tells us otherwise. Well known pagan civilizations noted in the Bible include Egypt and Babylon, both of which pre-date Greece and Rome. Further, the Old Testament is filled with references to the Israelites committing idolatry – and of course, that was long before Greece and Rome. Therefore, I think many people would immediately question your source or your research.
2. Though fairly certain of the definition of pagan, as you asked for my thoughts I consulted both Websters (9^th) and Chambers (a British dictionary). The two primary meanings are a) one who follows a polytheistic religion (polytheism being those who believe that God is more than one) – Chambers adds, "one who is not a Christian, Jew, or Mohammedan [these being the three major world religions that believe that God is one] – and b) one who has little or no religion, and who is hedonistic.
3. You asked if Jesus would approve of the worship given to him, and not his Father. In fact, Jesus said that he and his father were one (John 10:30), that if the Jews had seen him they had seen the Father (John 14:9) and claimed to be the great "I am" (the seven "I am" statements in the gospel of John). The Jews, who were and are monotheistic ["hear O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one" Deut. 6:4] sought to (and eventually succeeded) kill Jesus. "For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God" (John 5:18). Further, Jesus did accept worship, worship as God – (John 20:28).

Thus, polytheists would be those who believe that God is more than one, i.e. he is two, three, or even millions or billions. Christianity (as well as Judaism and Islam) insist that God is one. Christianity is unique in monotheism in asserting, given the testimony and clear teaching of the New Testament, that God is triune. That is, God is one, existing eternally as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. These three divine persons are co-eternal, one yet distinct. Jews and Moslems do not accept the deity of Jesus or of the Holy Spirit.

4. Many Christians who worship the coming of God in the flesh, Emmanuel (Matthew 1:23) are fully aware that no one knows an exact date when Jesus was born. They will note that the important thing is that we recognize his coming into the world – both his first coming, as well as the certainty of his second coming (some by the way celebrate his second coming on an exact day, but will say the same thing – not knowing the "exact hour" when he will return does not preclude us from anticipating his return).
5. Your research on Saint Nicholas and the Roman festival of the Saturnalia are missing the fact that the Christian church started as a Jewish Christian church, and as the New Testament makes clear, struggled with its "Jewishness" as it tried to determine its focus of worship. The books of Romans, Hebrews, Galatians, Colossians are particularly helpful in studying this topic. Thus – it was that by the second century the Christian church was adopting a number of worship celebrations that the old covenant never included. Jesus had been clear – the only ceremony that Christians were "required" to observe, that is failure to do so would mean that they would not remain in him, and that they would not have eternal life – that being the Lord’s Supper, the communion, where Christians take of the symbolic body and blood of the Lord. This ceremony, as oft as Christians might take it, commemorates the death of our Lord, and his atoning work on the cross on our behalf for our salvation.

When it came to celebrating the birth and the resurrection of the Lord, the Christian church took several hundred years to decide what it would do. And, it is true that pagan days were the exact times chosen, in an ironic way the early church decided to win these days/times of the year for Christ. And these days and times of the year, worldwide, have been won for Christ. Very few people anywhere think of polytheism at Christmas and Easter – even atheists and agnostics know that Jesus, in whom they do not believe, is the center of both celebrations. That fact is clear to everyone.

6. More specifically, I would agree that one can conclude that the times of Easter and Christmas were derived from pagan days, but one may not say that Christmas and Easter "are" pagan, for to do so is to malign and impugn the worship and belief of hundreds of millions of Christians around the world.
7. You note that you do not celebrate Christmas, nor do you try to stop those who do. There is nothing wrong, biblically, with such a position. Many Christians have decided to scale down their partying and the festivities that are not Christ centered – "Jesus is the reason for the season" is a statement that has formed their philosophy, and this view has waxed and waned within Christianity since the Reformation (Puritans, Presbyterians, holiness churches are among those who have a history of this approach). Thus, some Christians do not exchange gifts, some do not have a tree, some have a tree but no decorations outside their house, some simply do nothing other than going to church, and perhaps a performance of the Messiah.

There are many positions about this time of the year which are biblically acceptable – at the two extremes we could say that simply having a blow-out drunken party with no understanding of the deep and profound significance of what it means that our Savior came into this world, becoming flesh, humbling himself, is profane and pagan, given a secondary meaning of "pagan" as hedonism. On the other extreme, to condemn Christmas as pagan is to risk far more than "bah humbug" for millions of Christians are dedicated in their worship of God’s incarnation, and to condemn worship of God the Son is in itself open to charges of paganism.

We should also note that there are some who condemn Christmas as pagan who are, in fact, polytheists (that is they believe in more than one God, they believe in some cases that the ultimate destiny of man is to become God, which is polytheism). By the accepted dictionary definition of pagan, this would amount to pagans condemning something that Christians are doing, and calling one of their times of worship "pagan."

There is nothing wrong with being careful that we do not fall into excess, and there are many ways in which that can be done in our modern world. Christians need to be on guard, and I applaud your efforts in this regard. I hope some of the above will give you further food for thought.

In Jesus’ name,

Greg Albrecht