Christmas

The early Church had no celebration for the birth of Jesus. The date was unknown. However, with the growth of a calendar by which events in the life of Jesus could be commemorated in turn, the birth of Jesus was inevitably given a day, just as the single-day celebration at Easter was eventually spread through Holy Week. At first, 6 January was observed and a whole sequence of stories was rehearsed—birth, the visit of the Magi [[➝ magi]], and baptism. But in Rome, where 6 January was set aside for the Magi, it seems that in the 4th cent. CE the Church designated 25 December as the appropriate day for celebrating the Nativity because it had been the day of the pagan festival of Sol Invictus, when the unconquerable sun triumphed annually over the darkness of winter and the days grew longer again. There was a verse in Mal. (4:2) about the ‘Sun of Righteousness’ which could then seem to be especially apposite.