Taken from my earlier blog: For many years, we have all heard that 'this time of the year' is the most depressing time of the year. This article, The Most Depressing Time Of The Year In The Most Depressed Nation On The Planet had some interesting things to say about 'depression' and 'this time of the year.' To quote part of the article:
For large numbers of Americans,
the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas
is filled with stress, anxiety, loneliness and family squabbles.
Given that this time of the year is the most depressing, a time that probably most people think is supposed to be joyous, why is it so depressing? Is something missing about the Holidays? Why are the periods between Thanksgiving and Christmas filled with stress, anxiety, loneliness and family squabbles? Doesn't sound very happy to me...how about you? Do you celebrate the Holidays? Yes or no. And why that choice? I welcome your comments.
In the mean time, I took the liberty to look up some info on the Holidays. Wikipedia had this, in part, to say, under the subheading: Religious holidays: Many holidays are linked to faiths and religions (see etymology above). Christian holidays are defined as part of the liturgical year, the chief ones being Easter and Christmas. The Orthodox Christian and Western-Roman Catholic patronal feast day or "name day" are celebrated in each place's patron saint's day, according to the Calendar of saints. Jehovah's Witnesses annually commemorate "The Memorial of Jesus Christ's Death", but do not celebrate other holidays with any religious significance such as Easter, Christmas or New Year's. This holds especially true for those holidays that have combined and absorbed rituals, overtones or practices from non-Christian beliefs into the celebration, as well as those holidays that distract from or replace the worship of Jehovah.
Where do these holidays come from, as they are not teachings put forth from the Bible? Glad you asked. If you do a search for: Origin of Holidays, or search a specific holiday, Google search engine has a plethora of information on where they come from. I like this source, jw.org, because it references the Bible, and as you may have figured out by now, I love the Bible.
What Does the Bible Really Teach? APPENDIX Should We Celebrate Holidays? Also included in this Bible Based publication, Chapter 16, Take Your Stand for True Worship, starting at paragraph 6, helps us as well: CHRISTMAS-NOT CELEBRATED BY EARLY CHRISTIANS.
I truly feel this information is benificial to you if you are such that you have a genuine desire to be a follower of Christ, and you truly want to benifit from Bible teaching, and want to bring your life into harmony with what the Bible Teaches, not what man teaches, traditions without Biblical backing. But don't just take my word for it. Search these things out for yourself to see if they are supported by the Bible.
A reader asked me, do Jehovah's Witnesses celebrate the Holidays? Giving that the Holiday's do not have their origins in the Bible, we, Jehovah's Witnesses, I, do not celebrate the holidays. But I ask you, do you celebrate the Holidays? Yes? No? Why? I welcome your comments.
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