I saw an artificial Christmas tree on sale at Walmart that wasn’t a “Christmas” tree or an “Xmas” tree. On the box it was labeled “Cmas” tree. Is that a new way of getting around saying Christmas I wonder?

And Galatians 3:1 clearly is referring to a crucifix with a portrayal of Jesus on it, for starters. But you seem to be utilizing the bible in a way that it was not made to be used. The bible even admits itself that it does not contain everything that Jesus did. And nowhere does it say that we can ONLY do what is written in it. That would be ridiculous, and we couldn’t get through much of our day if that were the case…much less a worship service of any kind (including a Jehovah’s Witness service or whichever you are).

Christ founded a Church – the Catholic Church. That Church was given a certain authority (which they used to compile the books in your Bible). It also gave them a certain organizational authority to help the Church grow and celebrate and worship God in communion with each other. So naturally, scheduled feasts, structure, rituals, etc. developed. There is nothing wrong with them at all. In fact, they are beautiful and good. JW’s or whoever else all have their own rituals or rules they’ve come up with on their own based upon their own fallible interpretations of scripture and whatever else. Your arguments simply have no weight.

Call no leaders of the Church father? Where did Jesus say that? You are twisting scripture. He said “call no man father.” And obviously, like ANYTHING you read, you have to understand the context and literal intent of the writer. It did not mean that you plainly can not call any man father. That would be silly. It was obviously getting at a much deeper theological point.

And actually, Catholics don’t just practice “weekly” worship. We constant perpetual worship (as scripture says to pray without ceasing). Mass occurs every day at every hour somewhere in the world. It is the most communal and unified prayer mankind has ever known. But the weekly observance on Sunday was something the very first Christians practiced.

And you really need to learn a bit more about how the Church prays, why we pray to saints, etc. And if you think that the woman who literally gave God His humanity, His own flesh and blood body so that we could all be saved, was “just a normal woman” I’m not sure you understand the importance of Jesus and his death and resurrection. It’s BECAUSE Jesus is so Great that Mary is honored. It’s all Jesus, sir. I encourage you to learn more about what the Church actually teaches.

But again, you are misusing the bible anyway. And it doesn’t matter at all when Constantine got baptized. Really. Like means absolutely nothing regarding the Catholic Church, what she teaches, her authority given to her directly by Christ, or anything of that nature.

Additionally, you should check out what many of the early Christians said and did. You’ll find that what they believed and practiced was explicitly Catholic. And they did so long before Constantine (which you seem to be obsessed with).

Here are a few other posts/links you might be interested in:

Why do Catholics believe in things not in the Bible?
Do Catholics Worship Mary?
A lot of great quotes on tons of topics from the early Church
Did the early church move the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday?
Call no man “Father”?
Origins of Peter as Pope
Peter and the Papacy

Merry Christmas!

Cathoic church the followers call the leaders of the church father. Bible clearly speaks against that. Reguardless if catholics believe jesus gave peter the keys to heave & the thought is that if you forgive a person on earth it will be bond in heaven. Catholics completly misunderstand that verse in mathew. Show me one verse where Peter walked around telling people their sins are forgiven. He did what christ instructed which was baptize. He never walked around telling ppl they are forgive of their sins. ONLY GOD can do that.

Show me one verse in the bible authorizing a WEEKLY sunday worship. You won’t find it. Even the book “the faith of our fathers” written by a catholic bishop said the bible has not authorization of sunday worship because that was introduced by catholic church. I could go on for days about the catholic church contradictions,but that isn’t what my intentions are. The bible clearly say this is how you are to pray “my FATHER n heaven…” It doesn’t say anything about Mary. She is just a normal woman who found favor with God. Nothing more or less. & once jesus other PHYSICAL siblings became born Mary was no longer a Virgin! Explain this teaching to me that isn’t biblical. I’m sure you know the changes made at the council of nicea and the edict of milan. And also what happened in 313AD,312AD and 321AD etc. Constantine didn’t even get baptized until he was on his death bed. Read the book of revelation the book of Daniel. It is clearly about the catholic church.

God Bless You,but nothing I have said is hidden in history

Just because a particular holiday was implemented by the Church to celebrate something, and in doing so, they (wisely) co-opted existing (sometime pagan) holidays in the process doesn’t make them any less Christian. Nor any less holy. It makes it brilliant. What the Church did when it piggy-backed off of other non-Christian celebrations, was to take what was good from those celebrations and complete them with the fullness of Truth, with Christ. i.e. rather than saying, you’re a hell-bound heathens for worshipping, for example, the Sun, it said…you know what, recognizing that you are not the Sun and being appreciative that it makes all life possible on our planet is a pretty darn good start. Now let’s improve upon that by tweaking it just a little further and instead of focusing on the Sun, let’s focus on He who made the Sun (and everything else). It’s beautiful and natural and holy and absolutely Christian.

As for your other comments, come on. Scripture speaks over and over of “the Cross.” And it instructs us to preach Christ crucified. Even referring to images of Christ crucified.

And the whole myth that all of these things suddenly popped up inorganically in history at the time of Constantine simply is not credible and not believed by any credible historian. In fact, it was the same historical Catholic Church you are criticizing so harshly for celebrating the birth of Christ (God becoming a man) which also preserved, compiled and canonized the books that make up your bible that you are insisting upon.

Thanks for your thoughts!

To be clear, I didn’t say that it dishonors Christ to use an initial. But I still stand solidly behind my final paragraph. I would disagree that in our present day culture in America that the everyday person believes that using X as an abbreviation for Christ is “honoring Christ.” You may think so. But most people don’t. I think for most people seeing “Christmas” as opposed to “Xmas” is a more effective and clear reminder of what Christmas is all about. That’s all.