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First off, I do want to say that I consider it demeaning to shorten "Christian" to "Xtian." It's just a thing that I have.
Capn, most of the "traditions" that we associate with the Christian Holidays are remnants of older practices of the traditional religions and folk magic practices of the peoples that were converted to Christianity by the early church ... the Christmas Tree, the Yule Log, red and green as colors at Christmas ... all relate to pagan practices. Jesus, as near as anyone has been able to figure out, was probably born in the Spring. Yule is the festival of the Birth of the Sun ... the shortest day of the year, after which the days begin to lengthen. Ditto for the big spring festival ... Easter, celebrating the resurrection of Jesus, has it's basis in Ostara, a pagan festival honoring the reawakening of the Goddess Ostara or Oestre ... which is pronounced "eester." The Catholic Church schedules Easter by setting it on the first Sunday following the First Full Moon following the Spring Equinox (which is the date of the festival of Ostara).
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