When Did Christmas Start Being Celebrated On December 25

But it was not an official roman state festival at this time.

When did christmas start being celebrated on december 25. The first date listed december 25 is marked. Christmas wasn t always on dec. A feast central to the christian liturgical year it is preceded by the season of advent or the nativity fast and initiates the season of christmastide which historically in the. It followed saturnalia a festival where people feasted and exchanged gifts.

Christmas the holiday commemorating the birth of jesus christ is celebrated by a majority of christians on december 25 in the gregorian calendar but early christians did not celebrate his birth and no one knows on which date jesus was actually born some scholars believe that the actual date was in the early spring placing it closer to easter the holiday. By most accounts the birth was first thought in around 200 a d. Ultimately december 25 was chosen perhaps as early as a d. The first recorded date of christmas being celebrated on december 25th was in 336 during the time of the roman emperor constantine he was the first christian roman emperor.

However there are many different traditions and theories as to why christmas is celebrated on december 25th. Most christians today probably can t imagine christmas on any other day than december 25 but it wasn t always that way. This day december 25 336 is the first recorded celebration of christmas. To have taken place on jan.

Christmas or feast of the nativity is an annual festival commemorating the birth of jesus christ observed primarily on december 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. The day on which a saint died was considered more significant than his or her birth as it ushered him or her into the kingdom of heaven. For the first three hundred years of the church s existence birthdays were not given much emphasis not even the birth of christ. Christ was born in bethlehem of judea 3 in about 400 c e augustine of hippo mentions a local dissident christian group the donatists who apparently kept christmas festivals on december 25 but refused to celebrate the epiphany on january 6 regarding it.

In polytheistic rome december 25 was a celebration of the unconquered sun marking the return of longer days. The church in rome began celebrating christmas on december 25 during the reign of constantine the first christian emperor possibly to weaken pagan traditions. By 336 a d the roman church calendar definitively records a nativity celebration by western christians on this date.