[WackyKat]

That is interesting.I presume you belong to a church of the Orthodox family.

I had in mind the English speaking tradition.

"Easter" is derived from "Aester" the Anglo- Saxon goddess of spring and fertility.

Her totem animal was the hare and one of her symbols was the egg. Pretty clear.

Even more interesting is the true identity of Santa Claus.

His characteristics:

Is a large, old man with a grizzled beard

Lives in the far, snowy North

Flies by means of magical animals

Has magical means of spying of the activities of people

His helpers are elves

Visits people secretly

Can cloak himself with invisibility

Sometimes bestows gifts if the person has been good and requests them

So who is Santa Claus? He is Wotan-Woden-Odin. Santa's and Wotan's characteristics match very closely

Of course Wotan was a rather darker figure than Santa, but he has been sanitized for the kiddies.

[Conservababe]

Oh, lighten up. Let the kids go out trick or treating without guilt as they have done for years.

[The Grammarian]

To answer several of your posts at once:

1) Christmas and Easter are not "pagan" holidays in the sense that Halloween is, since they celebrate Christian history in a manner not nearly as associated with paganism as Halloween (Christmas, whatever else it is, celebrates Christ's birth, and Easter his resurrection--it doesn't matter that they are near pagan holidays on the calendar).

2) The Christmas tree is purportedly a tradition started by Martin Luther, according to some.

3) Santa Claus is derived from the Dutch spelling of Saint Nicholas, a Christian bishop in Turkey from a long, long time ago (over a millenium) who was well-known for some incidents involving anonymously giving out gifts of money to needy families. The special powers, etc., were not introduced until the late 19th century in an effort to commercialize the holiday more.

4) Valentine's Day is also a subject of debate, as some say that it is the day held in honor to St. Valentine, an early Christian.

5) I do not celebrate Halloween, although I do celebrate Christmas and Easter (I find Easter a lot more meaningful, however). I do not "throw out the baby with the bathwater," as the saying goes, in thinking that any holiday remotely associated with paganism either by date or name (in Easter's case) is evil. I simply find little in Halloween that resembles "All Hallows' Eve" more than Samhain.

[yevgenie]

Man, you would have loved my "Why Santa Claus should be banned" speech I gave when some family/friends asked me to speak at Christmastime. LOL. The kids sure loved it . . . come on now, "he sees you when you're sleeping"--grab the shotgun!

[yevgenie]

That is interesting.I presume you belong to a church of the Orthodox family.
Well, kind of. We had our own "reformation" soon after the Protestant Reformation of Europe. Belief-wise, we are protestant/evangelical in nature, but we do have a liturgical service derived from the St. James (Jesus' brother) liturgy of the first century. We have made a few changes to that service, changing the language, adding prayers for the President and his Cabinet, Senate, House, etc.

[marble]

very interesting, i often wondered about "Satan Claws"