History center event celebrates traditions of Christmas - Christmas Flowers Germany

The Northeast Georgia History Center brought a new light to Christmas traditions during their monthly Family Day.

"Cherish the Old, Embrace the New" focused on the origins of several beloved aspects of the season, from candy canes to the Christmas pickle. An assortment of craft projects were set up for the adults and children to enjoy, each designed to incorporate a different tradition.

"Everything that we're making has some root in tradition," explained Julie Carson, education and volunteer coordinator for the History Center.

"There's the history of Santa for the Santa photos, little elf pots, and so on," she said. "Some of these crafts are not traditionally what you'd put on the tree, but that's the part where you can embrace something new."

A board at the back of the room told stories from around the world of how some traditions began.

In christmas flowers germany , a pickle ornament would be hidden amongst the tree branches the evening before Christmas Eve. The first child to find the pickle would either be given an extra gift or be allowed to open his or her gifts first.

Another German and Ukrainian story is The Christmas Spider, which claimed that the spiders, who hid in the attic during Christmas cleaning, snuck down to admire the decorated tree, but left webbing behind on the branches. When St. Nicholas arrived, he turned the webbing silver, and since that night, the Christmas trees have been trimmed with tinsel.

The English tradition of kissing under the mistletoe was formerly a rite of marriage. In later centuries, it was thought if a girl was not kissed beneath the mistletoe, she would not marry in the year to come.

Choices in decor were not the only traditions explained. Christmas carols originally began as pagan songs celebrating Winter Solstice, which usually occurs around the 22nd. The first Christmas carol was written in 1450, but nothing remains for the song.

The Enota Show Choir and Gainesville High School's Crimson Chorus provided a wonderful medley of classic and revamped tunes to ring in the holiday season. Santa Claus himself even stopped by.

Old or new, some traditions will forever be favorites. For Page Thompson and Johnathan Mixon, Christmas morning can't be beat.

I love getting presents," Thompson said.

"Reading christmas flowers germany blog stories before bed is my favorite," said Alexander Mixon.

The Northeast Georgia History Center hosts Family Day the second Sunday every month from 1-4 p.m. For more information, visit www.negahc.org.

It's Your Mail - Christmas Flowers Germany

The first Christmas card arrived in the mail slot at my house earlier this week. It was a photo-greeting card from an old friend who lives in Ohio. He and his wife posed in playful stances with their two grown children, their spouses and a new grandbaby.

They could have sent the card by e-mail, but it wouldn't have been the same. I would have glanced at it quickly and moved on. Currently, it is on my kitchen counter. When I receive more cards and photos, I will post them on the louvered doors in the dining room I use to display each year's seasonal greetings.

The news this week is that the U.S. Postal Services is making plans to reduce service. Communication and shipping methods have been evolving for decades and the post office has seen its market share erode into oceans of red ink.

A Long Island resident interviewed on National Public Radio this week said that she considered her post office box a nuisance receptacle for junk mail. A pharmacist in Montana said his elderly clients in far-flung communities rely totally on the U.S. mail service for their prescriptions.

I grew up on rural route one, southeast of Canton, Kans. 67428. The daily county seat newspaper never reached the local post office in time for rural delivery route departures. It always arrived in our mailbox a day late. It didn't get read any less.

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In my Webster Groves office, daily mail service is still an integral part of business operations. Bills go out. Checks arrive. Some press releases and letters still arrive by mail. When Carol, our regular carrier is on vacation, our service level dips a bit too.

If mail service slows, there will be a slight delay in cash flow - the bill may take a day longer to reach the client. The return check may take a day more to arrive. But we can weather that change.

Mail service, despite its detractors, is dependable. That needs to stay the same. Box pickup frequencies, especially near the end of business days, are important if business use is to remain high.

Magazines and periodicals will take a bigger hit. But then again, do I read my Time Magazine or my Kiplinger Newsletter the day it arrives? Usually not. Am I likely to cancel my mailed subscriptions and read those publications online? No, but some readers who haven't already, will make that transition. I prefer the leisurely pace of content on paper. My eyes and mind are programmed to absorb a lot more on paper than from pixels on a screen.

Can the U.S. Mail compete in the sea of communication changes? We might look at models from other countries to get ideas. German post offices reinvented themselves a couple of decades ago after reunification of East and West christmas flowers germany . They have maintained six day home delivery and offer a variety of services including banking and mobile phones.

I wish that in 2012, political parties would have to pay a surcharge to use my mailbox for their usual election deluge of quarter-truths and outright falsehoods.

For charities, the mail is an important tool. I regard it with more sympathy than I do those agencies that pay a commission for professional phone solicitors. I very rarely respond to e-mail requests.

Meanwhile, I will look for those christmas flowers germany blog cards among the solicitations for year-end donations that stuff my mailbox. I intend to write my traditional season's greetings letter and mail it with cards in time for Christmas.

Buy stamps. Say hello to your mail carrier. It will be a challenging new year for the people who deliver our mail.

University of Pittsburgh's Nationality Rooms bring to life ethnic characters and traditions - Christmas Flowers Germany

Lurking behind Father Christmas is the evil Cert, a black devil who carries switches, threatening to whack bad children.

More frightening than a pile of coal under the tree, Cert is part of Austria's Christmas folklore.

Such ethnic holiday characters and traditions come alive in 27 classrooms, known as the Nationality Rooms, at the University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning in Oakland until Dec. 31.

Christmas traditions, Chinese New Year, Sukkot and Kwanzaa are represented in the Nationality Rooms, each decked in distinctive splendor by a committee of Pittsburgh-area residents.

The holiday dress-up is about preserving traditions. It has become a tradition itself, running for more than 40 years.

"People come here and discover something about their background they didn1t know," says E. Maxine Bruhns, director of the Nationality Rooms program and a longtime, former Fox Chapel resident.

The also come to learn about other cultures, as Bruhns did when she lived all over the world with her husband, the late Fred Bruhns, who resettled refugees.

"I've seen children burst into tears in Austria, when the little Cert comes along behind Father Christmas in the streets during Christmas parades," Bruhns says.

The characters of Christmas change with every room.

In Greece, St. Nicholas is the patron saint of seamen. His icon is in the Greek Room, but "he doesn't look anything like Santa Claus," Bruhns says.

The holiday centerpiece in the Greek room is the Christopsomo, decorated bread that is part of an elaborate Christmas Day feast.

More than trees

In the Chinese room, a dragon sits on gold paper commemorating the year of the dragon Jan. 23, 2012, on the American calendar.

Given China's predominant religions of Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism, there are no Christmas celebrations. So, the committee decorates for Chinese New Year and a string of other holidays, according to Karen Yee of Bethel Park, the chairwoman of the Chinese Nationality Room committee.

A favorite Chinese New Year tradition is the Lion Dance, featuring young ancers under a large, colorful fabricated lion head and body.

The New Year also is a time of giving: "The children wish the elders a happy, prosperous New Year and, like magic, the adults pull out red envelopes with the lucky money inside, like Halloween here," Yee says.

Red is the color of choice because it signifies luck, while white is considered the color of death, she says.

Yee's committee hung red banners around the Chinese Room's door frame for luck. Offering a plate of cut tangerines also is a good-luck tradition.

China's vast size makes it impossible to capture all of its traditions.

Yee estimates there are 300 ethnic minorities in China. "So, there are many different customs in many areas."

Yee's father, the late Hoy Fung, a Chinese immigrant who owned the Bellevue Tea Garden restaurant from 1926 to 1998, "always shared his culture. And he said that it was important for people to know each other and get along."

New Years trees

As students helped to decorate the Russian Room recently, they wondered why there wasn1t a Christmas tree, says Christine Metil of Squirrel Hill, treasurer of the Russian Room committee.

"Some people were disappointed," she says. "Russians have trees, but they are New Year's trees."

Fasting on Christmas Eve until the first star appeared is one of the earliest Russian Orthodox holiday traditions.

Then, Russian families sat down to a meal served on a white tablecloth with straw covering it to symbolize Christ1s birth, Metil said.

Another Russian Orthodox tradition is a door-to-door folk performance, a "vertap," a Bethlehem play using a box lined with straw and religious figurines of Joseph, the Three Kings and shepherds but no Mary or Jesus.

"In orthodoxy, it is not permitted to depict the holy Christ and Mary in statuary," Metil says.

But there are trees, branches and other Western Christmas decor, courtesy of Russian tsar Peter the Great.

After a trip to Europe in the 1700s, the Russian leader was impressed with the West and its trees and other decorations.

"Christmas trees never caught on in Russia until the mid-19th century, but were then banned from 1917 until 1992 in keeping with Soviet ideology," Metil says.

That's why the decorated trees during that period were known as "New Year trees," she says.

Legend credits christmas flowers germany with creating the Christmas-tree tradition, but it was love that brought the fancy-decorated tree to England in the Victorian era.

"Queen Victoria loved her Prince Albert more than anything," says Anna Lomando of Arnold, chairwoman of the English Room committee. 3But he was from  christmas flowers germany blog and was lonely and wanted a Christmas tree. She would have done anything for him.2 So, the queen installed a Christmas tree in the palace.

"She may have loved Prince Albert, but her subjects loved her so much, they did the same thing and got Christmas trees," Lomando says.

So the Victorian Christmas tree, the storybook Christmas tree, takes center stage in the English Nationality Room.

Satin sashes rib the length of a tree richly decorated with candles.

The tree is filled with miniature wrapped gift boxes, decorative paper fans and cornucopia filled with candy.

"It's OK if they eat from the cornucopia," Lomando says.

"We don't care.

Christmas is for fun."

True stories of those who discovered the Christmas tree(s) - Christmas Flowers Germany

This isn't an essay about the history of the christmas flowers germany blog tree, whose tradition can be traced back to late-Middle Ages christmas flowers germany , but rather, a brief history about the people who discovered some of them. This is not quite as boring as it sounds.

In the 1700s and 1800s, botanical treasure hunting in the Americas was every bit as swashbuckling as high-seas piracy or any other sort of adventuresome career you can think of. The man for whom the Douglas fir was named was stomped to death by a fitfully angry bull in close quarters, for example. Either that or he was murdered. Nobody knows for certain.

What is certain, though, is that in the 1700s and 1800s, the New World was full of plants that the rest of the world had never seen. Gardening as a hobby was just beginning to take off in England and Russia, and elsewhere in Europe, too; thus, there was big money to be made in discovering exotic specimens and bringing their seeds back to the Old World for propagation.

Finding new plants meant years of climbing mountains and crossing deserts and fording rivers, all of it done by men of dubious scientific training, who were more or less ill-suited for lives of rugged exploration.

   

JOHN JEFFREY –– Jeffrey Pine

   

Scottish-born, as many of the great North American plant hunters were, John Jeffrey was selected to travel to America in 1849 to collect plants for the next five years. What his friends and relatives thought of this decision at the time is unrecorded by historical accounts.

Mostly, he explored the Pacific Northwest, and near California's Mount Shasta, he documented what is now known as the Jeffrey Pine, one of many popular Christmas-tree iterations in the West. In 1854, having departed from San Diego, he attempted a crossing of the Colorado Desert. He was never seen again. "Among plant hunters of the Northwest, John Jeffrey was like a shooting star, a quick twinkle soon extinguished," writes Frank Lang.

There are several accounts of Jeffrey's death. Contemporary James McNab wrote: "It appears that he was killed trading with Indians." Frederick V. Coville believes Jeffrey "perished of thirst on the Colorado Desert." A third account says "he was murdered by a Spanish outcast, for his mule and scanty traveling-appointments."

   

DAVID DOUGLAS –– Douglas-Fir

   

David Douglas, likewise Scotland born, made the same Pacific Northwest trip as John Jeffrey, but decades earlier. In 1824, he began his multiyear exploration of the region, discovering several types of conifers.

In 1827, he introduced the Douglas-fir into wide cultivation (though it had already been "discovered" by rival botanist Archibald Menzies, which is how the Douglas-fir got its scientific name, Pseudotsuga menziesii). The Douglas-fir is not a true fir, and there are several species of it, found all over the world. But Douglas is the person who gave the tree its common name.

By age 35, he was already one of the most celebrated botanists in Europe, and he took a much-deserved vacation to Hawaii in 1833.

Climbing Mauna Kea, he is said to have fallen into a wild-animal pit trap. If that wasn't bad enough, the trap was already –– or soon after became –– occupied by a bull, which was not pleased about its predicament, as you can imagine.

He (Douglas, not the bull) was found dead some time later, apparently by a hunter named Ned Gurney, who also happened to be an escaped convict. This led to some speculation that Gurney had killed Douglas for the cash he was carrying on him, and while he was a suspect in Douglas' death, he was never arrested.

   

C.J. LEYLAND –– Leyland Cypress

   

C.J. Leyland was not a plant hunter, but his story is just as interesting. Born Christopher John Naylor in 1849, C.J. changed his surname to Leyland after inheriting Haggerston Castle, part of Leyland Entailed Estates, from his uncle, a well-to-do banker. After moving into the castle in the 1890s, he began an ambitious gardening and landscaping program across 23,000 acres.

One result of his efforts was the propagation of Cupressocyparis leylandii, a sterile hybrid of the Nootka Cypress and the Monterey Cypress (inter-genetic breeding between two different trees is rare, which is why the offspring must be passed down by root cuttings). The Leyland Cypress is a lush, hardy and fast-growing evergreen, and for many years, it was one of the best-selling plants in Great Britain. In 1941 the cuttings arrived in the U.S.

C.J. Leyland might have gone on to greater botany notoriety were it not for the unfortunate "fact" that the castle was the victim of a witch's curse, which, legend has it, resulted in at least three fires at the castle. The last of the fires occurred in 1911, burning down part of the grounds, and Leyland never lived in the castle again (or tended to its gardens). It was demolished in the 1930s.

   

JOHN FRASER –– Fraser Fir

   

The Fraser fir is found in the Eastern U.S. and Appalachia. John Fraser –– again, a Scotsman –– is credited with the discovery in this case. He was a linen draper who, mid-career, decided to take up botany collection. It was a good career choice, and his collecting led him to Eastern North America in the late 1700s.

    Fraser was remarkably successful at transplanting living seedlings across the oceans, which means he was a remarkably profitable plant hunter. One biographer credits his method of "packing them (seedlings) in wet moss" before shipping them off for his financial success. After discovering the fir that now bears his name, he moved farther south, then into Cuba, exploring with his son and "disguised as Americans" (fake passports and all) rather than Englishmen, because the English were at war with the Spanish at the time.

Their ruse was discovered, writes David C. Stuart in "The Plants That Shaped Our Gardens," but the governor of Cuba let them explore freely, saying: "My country, it is true, is at war with England, but not with the pursuits of these travelers."

The Cuban exploration got off to a rocky start, but the trip there was even worse. Fraser's ship was wrecked on a coral reef between Havana and Florida and stranded for several days before being rescued by a Spanish salvage boat. On his way back to England, his boat again nearly sank. A decade later, exploring the mountains of South Carolina, his horse lost its balance and fell on top of him, crushing his ribs. He died from those injuries the following year, in 1811.

   

Postscript: Oddly enough, there was a great Victorian botanist named David Spruce, but he did not have anything to do with the Spruce tree. He spent more than a decade exploring the Andes and the Amazon River in the mid-1800s, collecting odd medicinal specimens, including quinine, a bitter bark that makes an excellent anti-malaria drug (and an ingredient in Campari and many tonic waters).

   

Bill Toland, who during his high-school years cut down Christmas trees to make extra holiday money, is a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette staff writer. Email btoland@post-gazette.com.

A living history -Christmas Flowers Germany

Moravians understood the importance of audio-visual educational techniques centuries before the first overhead projector or interactive Smart Board was invented. Always vitally interested in instructing future generations, especially in the realm of history, early Moravians developed a series of repeated sights and sounds to reinforce each lesson.

The annual Candle Tea played a vital role in that early educational process, and members of Mayodan Moravian Church continued that tradition last Thursday by hosting second-grade classes from Dillard Elementary School for a tour of the church.

Started by early Moravians as a special arts and crafts fair, the Candle Tea now represents an opportunity for children to learn key elements of Moravian history and beliefs. Second-graders touring the church last Thursday made six stops along the way, each providing a visual history lesson.

Divided into small groups to make the learning experience more personal, the second-grade classes circulated through the 115-year-old church. Mayodan Moravian member Mike Fox spoke to the students seated on the steps outside the main sanctuary, explaining the history of the Moravian movement and church they were about to enter.

The cornerstone for the Mayodan church was laid July 26, 1896, with about 200 people present to witness the ceremony. But Fox said the story behind that beginning went back a few years earlier.

“The story actually began in September, 1890, when the Home Church Sunday School took an excursion on the new Roanoke and Southern Railroad to the falls of the Mayo River,” Fox said. “They had a picnic there and held a Moravian lovefeast that afternoon.”

Fox said Col. Francis Fries, a member of Home Moravian Church in Salem (now Winston-Salem), must have remembered the location from that picnic. It was the location he chose to build his textile mills, Avalon Mill and Mayo Mill. Fries was also instrumental in founding a new town, Mayodan, near the convergence of the Mayo and Dan rivers.

Fries contacted his Home Church pastor, Bishop Edward Rondthaler, and invited him to visit the area to help select a site for a new Moravian church. The bishop’s son, Howard Rondthaler, was appointed as the first pastor when the new 225-seat church building opened in November 1896.

Entering the sanctuary of the church, the students first noticed the large Moravian star hanging high above the pulpit area. The first multi-pointed star originated more than 150 years ago in  christmas flowers germany , apparently as part of an evening handicraft project.

The star is lit at the beginning of Advent season and proclaims a three-point message.

“It’s a reminder of the star that led the wise men to the baby Jesus,” Mayodan Moravian member Julie Joyce told a group of second-graders from Dillard Elementary.

The star also portrays Jesus as the Divine Star, “the bright and morning star,” and is seen as the star of promise and of hope.

Dressed in traditional 18th-century Moravian clothing, Joyce also explained the tradition and meaning of the Advent candle wreath on the table in front of the pulpit. Each of the four candles represented a different element of the Christmas story told each week during the Advent season. The four candles represented love, hope, peace and joy.

Heading from the sanctuary to the fellowship hall, the students made a stop at a glass case in the hallway holding several items of historic value. They were able to see and hear about hymnals and Bibles printed more than 100 years earlier and hear stories of the early days of the Mayodan church.

Passing into the fellowship hall, the students made a stop in the kitchen to watch the preparation traditional Moravian cookies. The students learned that the secret to the unique cookies was to “roll them so thin you can almost see through them” and that the dark brown color came from using molasses as a key ingredient.

Still munching on samples of the crisp, thin cookies, the students stood at their next station watching Bonnie Connelly explain how to make beeswax candles – a Christmas tradition for Moravians.

Like the Moravian star, the candles also have special significance.

“They were first used in a Christmas Eve service for children in christmas flowers germany blog around 1747,” Connelly said.

The candles are still made with the same formula of beeswax and tallow in tapered molds designed by early Moravian settlers. The traditional red paper wrapped around the base of candles represents the blood of Jesus and the candle itself represents Christ as the “light of the world.”

Circling the fellowship hall, the students heard more about the history of the Moravian church and saw a Christmas tree decorated the way colonial families would have done it. Most of the students quickly identified a couple familiar items not normally associated with Christmas trees – candles and popcorn. A third item – bright, red berries – was also present.

“Those were the only things available for people to use for decorations a hundred years ago,” Connelly said. “That’s why they waited until Christmas day to cut the tree and decorate it. The tree and decorations didn’t last long in those days.”

The final stop on the tour took the second-graders to the top floor of the Moravian church, to a darkened room holding several miniature displays – the traditional Moravian Putz (pronounced “puts”). The German word putz means “decoration” and that’s how the original displays were used.

Early Moravians created miniature depictions of the story of Jesus’ birth, ranging from simple manger scenes to elaborate villages that filled a room. The Putz at Mayodan Moravian contains five scenes – two from the story of Jesus’ birth, one historic representation of Old Salem, a scene from Mayodan in 1896 and a historic rural scene from Rockingham County.

With the lights out, the children enjoyed the scene over ancient Bethlehem illuminated only by lights from candles, hearth fires and the brilliant star hanging above the stable where the baby Jesus lay in a manger surrounded by Mary, Joseph and the shepherds.

The 1896 view of Mayodan shows the original Mayodan Moravian Church building as one of only a handful of buildings present then, including Mayo Mills and the train depot.

Christmas Flowers Germany - Principal stands by cancelling Christmas concert

An east Ontario school principal said she stands by her decision to call off a christmas flowers germany blog concert even after she's started getting threatened.

Mhairi Rowland, principal of Cambridge Public School in Embrun, said she would be replacing its traditional concert with a holiday-themed craft fair and moving the concert to February.

Rowland said she's shocked at the backlash she's been getting but stands by her decision,

"I've had a lot of hate mail this morning from people saying this is a religious thing, and it's really not," she said. "The decision to change the concert to February was really so that every child gets to have the joy and the rush of standing up on a stage and performing in front of people that they love."

She said the decision wasn't spurred on by a complaint, and about half the school's parent council agreed with her.

About 207 students go to the school, located about 40 kilometres southeast of Ottawa. All but nine of them celebrate Christmas.

"It hit home, I guess," said Peggy O'Meara, who sits on the school's parent council.

"Maybe they can just adjust it a bit," said one parent. "Not necessarily do the nativity and things like that, but still the christmas flowers germany sprit part, Santa Claus."

A leading Ottawa Jewish figure said the move isn't the way to go.

"Christmas has been under assault for the last little while under the guise of inclusivity," said Rabbi Reuven Bulka. "I never thought that inclusivity meant that if you're going something I don't like, you can't do it anymore because it's excluding me."

Friday, the Upper Canada School Board released a statement saying other Christmas activities are happening at the school including a tree-decorating contest and carol singing at a local senior's home.

"The director of education also supports that decision because of the inclusivity that it represents and the respect it shows for all students in the school," said Terry Simzer with the school board.

Some Cambridge parents said they hope the school will consider bringing the concert back next year, something they'll have a chance to express when a survey comes out in the spring.

Christmas Flowers germany -Christmas shares December with other holidays

Silver bells, red holly berries, white lights and green trees all start appearing around the first of December, taking their place alongside crèches, menorahs and other sacred images.

December is a month filled with religious observances. Many are related to Christmas, the day Christians celebrate the birth of Christ.

But others are from different religions and cultures. In short, December offers something for just about everyone. Even sun worshippers can have their day in the sun — make that a week.

The annual Winter Solstice Sadhana Celebration will be held Dec. 18-24 at the Circle F Dude Ranch in Lake Wales, Fla. Forget about roast turkey, dressing and pumpkin pie, though. Menu items include yogi tea with soy milk, steamed beets and celery, among other holiday delights.

More familiar holidays include the Feast Day of St. Nicolas on Tuesday, the commemoration of Our Lady of Guadalupe on Dec. 12, Hanukkah or the Festival of Lights on Dec. 20, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and Watch Night on Dec. 31, a tradition in African-American culture thanking God for bringing people safely through another year and asking his blessing for the coming year.

In some Christian traditions, the anticipation of Christmas actually begins in November with the season of Advent, which is Latin for "the coming." Advent began Nov. 27 in Western Christian churches and Nov. 15 in Orthodox churches.

"It is a time of fasting, almsgiving, reconciliation and other spiritual disciplines that help us prepare to welcome and receive Christ at Christmas," said Philip LeMasters, professor of religion at McMurry University and a priest at St. Luke Orthodox Church.

Advent is a solemn time of preparation, but occurring in the midst of it is the more festive Feast of St. Nicolas, the celebration of the patron saint of children and role model for gift giving.

"He's a much-loved and honored saint in the Orthodoxy and is commemorated regularly in the services of the Orthodox Church," LeMasters wrote in an email.

He's also much-loved by children everywhere and is the most highly anticipated visitor to households worldwide on Christmas Eve. Various stories are associated with St. Nicolas, but they all originated with Nicolas, the bishop of Myra in Lycia, who died Dec. 6 in either 345 or 352.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, "there is scarcely anything historically certain about him except that he was bishop of Myra in the fourth century." The encyclopedia states that the tradition of Nicolas being behind those secret Christmas gifts developed in christmas flowers germany  , Switzerland and the Netherlands.

St. Nicolas' background isn't the only thing lacking certainty when it comes to  christmas flowers germany blog and other religious traditions.

A glance across the major world religions shows connections to natural transitions, including seasons of the year, noted David Kneip, who teaches church history at Abilene Christian University.

That is certainly true with religious observances in December as fall gives way to winter or the winter solstice, which varies from Dec. 20-23. This year, winter begins on Dec. 22.

That also helps explains all the lights associated with December religious holidays — the first day of winter is the day with the shortest amount of sunlight.

That doesn't explain all the reasons for the use of light as a religious symbol, of course, even in December.

The Jewish observance of Hanukkah, which begins at sundown Dec. 20, is known as the Festival of Lights. It's not because of the December date but refers to the origin of the observance, which is based on the rededication of the Jerusalem Temple in 165-164 B.C.

The story tells of the miraculous oil lamp that burned for eight days when it was filled with oil sufficient for only one day. A major symbol of Hanukkah is the eight-candle menorah.

In Christian tradition, the light represents Jesus, "the light of the world." The Christ Candle is set in the middle of an Advent wreath and is surrounded by four candles, one for each week leading to Christmas. The lighting of the Christ Candle marks the birth of Christ.

The date that Christmas is celebrated — Dec. 25 — wasn't standardized by the church until the fourth century when the bishop of Rome declared it.

The reason most cited is that the date coincides with the pagan festival that celebrated the birth of the unconquered sun. But Kneip, who teaches worship and early Christianity at ACU, said there is disagreement among scholars over whether the date was chosen to counteract the pagan festival.

He noted that in the third century when the "unconquered sun" festival was celebrated, something else was taking place in the Roman Empire.

"That's right about the time that Christianity was growing exponentially," he said.

The disagreement is over which came first — Christians' celebrating Jesus' birth on Dec. 25, or the festival of the unconquered sun.

"There are reputable scholars on both sides of that argument," Kneip said. "It really could have gone either way."