+- The South Pacific (https://tspforums.xyz)
+-- Forum: Hall of Historical Records (https://tspforums.xyz/forum-8.html)
+--- Forum: Archives (https://tspforums.xyz/forum-141.html)
+---- Forum: Celebration Pavilion (https://tspforums.xyz/forum-97.html)
+----- Forum: 2018 Advent Calendar (https://tspforums.xyz/forum-415.html)
+----- Thread: Day 6 - Multicultural Holiday Discussion (/thread-6675.html)
Day 6 - Multicultural Holiday Discussion - Pencil Sharpeners - 12-06-2018
Today is our multicultural celebration day! While Advent is a Christian celebration, many other faiths and cultures have celebrations around this time of year. We'd like to hear about the holidays and celebrations of TSPers from around the World!
Now, I'm an atheist, but still celebrate the less religious (and more corporate...) side of Christmas. I'd be interested to know if any other non-Christians-living-in-Christian-countries do the same. I suspect most atheists/agnostics will be in the same boat as me, but those of other faiths will probably maintain their own celebrations instead.
RE: Day 6 - Multicultural Holiday Discussion - Morinth20 - 12-06-2018
I am an atheist myself and I continue to celebrate Christmas to be with my family and friends and to give to those who are in need as well. I love spreading joy to other people during the holidays. Some of my family believe in god so even if I'm an atheist, I will still pray around the table with them. That's how I celebrate anyway.
RE: Day 6 - Multicultural Holiday Discussion - Somyrion - 12-07-2018
I’m culturally Jewish (belief is for another time!) and celebrate Hanukkah. But because a quarter of my family is Christian (Quaker, for the most part) we do also celebrate Christmas, traditionally with one side of the family doing Hanukkah and the other doing Christmas. Partly because the Christians in my family are Quaker, and partly because the rest of us are Jewish all the rest of the time, our Christmas has really zero to do with Christ (apart from the occasional folks going to a midnight mass for the music). It’s about the tree, and baking, and family, and so on...
One thing I like to remind people of about Hanukkah is that it’s not a major holiday. It’s not in the Bible and therefore doesn’t require abstaining from working, or praying, and so on. It’s a “fun” festival (together with Purim) which gets much more coverage than any other Jewish holiday because of its “holiday season” timing and marketability.
One of the problems with Hanukkah lasting eight nights and occurring before the end-of-year break for our family tends to be that everyone’s far too busy to really engage the holiday. We’ll light the hanukiah at dinner, and exchange a couple presents the first and last nights, but no one will do much dreidel-rolling or sufganiyot-eating more than maybe once.
RE: Day 6 - Multicultural Holiday Discussion - Hammerstar - 12-09-2018
Islam changes its dates based on the islamic calendar. But the closest one to December this year would be the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. On the 30th of November for Sunni and 5th of December for Shias.
It is basically quite festive in other muslim nations, Indonesia however isn't as festive as Iran. But we keep these things to heart, as we don't really (and shouldnt) want to go overboard on too much celebrities.