For anyone who doesn’t celebrate Christmas traditionally (i.e. Santa, tree, stockings, etc…) what do you do for Christmas? This is my second year not celebrating it traditionally (I never did Santa but always had the tree and decorations) and I’m at a loss for what I should do. We did gifts last year and had a nice dinner and watched The Nativity Story, but didn’t do anything else. I want to do something this year, to make it special, but still have it revolve around Jesus’s birth. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
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The reason why we do the Santa is because he was actually St Nicholas. He gave gifts to sick children so they nicknamed him Santa.
Start Dec1 reading 1 chapter a day in the Gospel of Luke and concentrate on the God Man, Jesus. On Christmas Eve you will have read the Life of Jesus
I read of someone else’s tradition that I plan on incorporating this year. Normally I will put up the manger scene on December 1st with everybody in it, and leave it up until after christmas. But some other person said that since the wise men weren’t there that very night (it took them a few years), what they’ve always done in their family is put the wise men somewhere else in the house and then every night throughout December they’ll move closer and closer to the manger scene. And then on Christmas day they’ll be in the manger scene with everybody else. Which is still technically inaccurate but it’s not like we’re going to leave the manger scene up for 2 years and then add the wise men LOL. But she said when her and her siblings were little kids they would wake up every morning and see that the wise men had moved closer to the manger scene as if they did it on their own while they were sleeping LOL. So I decided, even though it’s just me, I’m going to put my wise men on the other side of the house and every night I’ll just move them a little closer to the manger scene. I don’t know I thought it was cute. Definitely a good replacement for that creepy Elf on the Shelf thing. She also said that the baby Jesus wouldn’t appear in the manger scene until Christmas Day. Which makes sense. She and her siblings would get so excited about it, instead of running downstairs to see if there were presents, they would run downstairs to see if Jesus was in the manger scene. So I think I’m going to do that as well.
Do you do the Advent wreath? Where you light a candle every Sunday and read scripture? I’m pretty sure that it starts this Sunday while still in November. I have attempted to do it the past 2 years and failed miserably. This will be my year! LOL
I celebrate CHRIST-mas! I recognize that the date isn’t the day Jesus was born, but it’s a great time to appreciate the Birth of Christ. I still do the “traditional” Christmas stuff also, but there is symbolism behind it now. For example, a candy cane. A candy cane can be used as a symbol for Jesus!
I see no reason to not celebrate Christmas, so long as you are celebrating the birth of the Lord. Not Santa. There is nothing wrong with giving gifts. We should have a giving heart. But if you wish to make it special, try using the time and money you save and feed the homeless or do something for someone in need on that day. Make it about doing good for others.
Ice skating, driving around look at Christmas lights, collect pine cones and do some kinda craft. Some churches do a live nativity try to find one near you. These things are Christmas specific but doing these activities around the holidays makes it feel nice. I buy a few gifts for my family. I hate the pressure of buying gifts so if I don’t see anything they would like than no one gets anything but I saw some stuff this year so they’ll have like 4 gifts to open
I grew up very old-fashioned Mennonite. Long hair, up in a bun, with a cap over it. Long, homemade dresses. No TV, no radio. Mliked a cow by hand. the whole bit. LOL
Yes, we did celebrate Christmas… but we didn’t have any tree, and of course didn’t tell the Santa lie to children.
What we did was very simple practical gifts, but not many of them. Most were homemade, such as embroidered aprons, knitted mittens, etc. (I remember a very crude doll closet I made once for a sister. scrap wood from Papa’s shop, and hangers made from electrical wire scraps.) We wrapped them in brown paper bag paper, decorated with crayons. We piled them on the coffee table, which for the season was parked under the picture window, and covered with a white sheet.
Oh, and that picture window! Every year, one teenage sister was chosen to paint (tempera paints wash off) the entire window in a Christmas scene. I remember one year it was a large angel over shepherds on a hillside… another year was a star over Bethlehem… another year was the word JOY over a manger. We did string a few lights up, but not many.
But my favorite Christmas memory of all was Jesus’ Birthday Party!
Every Christmas Eve, Mama baked a cake and decorated it with a large yellow star in the middle, and two tall candles on each side, one for each thousand years.
We finished dinner and washed up the dishes excitedly, because we knew what was about to happen!
Then we all went and got our piggy banks, and sat around the dining room table… (Mama had 9 children.) And we turned off all the lights, as Mama lit the candles on the cake. We all sang Biblical Christmas carols, such as “Silent Night”… and then came my favorite part.
Mama slid the lit cake very close to Papa (our stepdad) who sat at the head of the table… and Papa read in his deep, expressive voice, the entire Christmas story out of the Bible.
How I remember the quiet hush in the darkness, as the candles flickered, and we heard that dear, old story again. After the reading was over, Papa would clear his throat and say, “and that’s how Jesus came to earth, to die for our sins.”
And then, Mama would say, “Jesus came as a very poor baby. We are celebrating His birthday, but we can’t give Him a present because He’s in heaven. But Jesus said that if we do something for someone else, we are actually doing it to Him! So tonight, we are each going to give Him a gift by giving something to a poor child.”
And a plate would be passed around the table, as we each gave something from our piggy banks to help the poor. In remembrance of poor little baby Jesus, born in a barn.
And then, the lights would come on, and the 2 littlest children blew out the candles. And we all had cake and ice cream before we went to bed.
And the next morning, of course, we opened presents, one by one.
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