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It has been parodied that the Christmas season is too early. This is understandable, as Christmas related advertisements usually begin these days immediately following Halloween. This breaks the tradition of having Christmastide follow Thanksgiving. In It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown , this is parodied by having a department store all prepared for Christmas during Easter.
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Christmastide's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.
Reference named "Forbes2008":
In 567 the Council of Tours proclaimed that the entire period between Christmas and Epiphany should be considered part of the celebration, creating what became known as the twelve days of Christmas, or what the English called Christmastide. On the last of the twelve days, called Twelfth Night, various cultures developed a wide range of additional special festivities. The variation extends even to the issue of how to count the days. If Christmas Day is the first of the twelve days, then Twelfth Night would be on January 5, the eve of Epiphany. If December 26, the day after Christmas, is the first day, then Twelfth Night falls on January 6, the evening of Epiphany itself. After Christmas and Epiphany were in place, on December 25 and January 6, with the twelve days of Christmas in between, Christians gradually added a period called Advent, as a time of spiritual preparation leading up to Christmas.
{{
cite book}}
: |access-date=
requires |url=
(
help)What Dickens did advocate in his story was "the spirit of Christmas." Sociologist James Barnett has described it as Dickens's "Carol Philosophy," which "combined religious and secular attitudes toward to celebration into a humanitarian pattern. It excoriated individual selfishness and extolled the virtues of brotherhood, kindness, and generosity at Christmas. . . .Dickens preached that at Christmas men should forget self and think of others, especially the poor and the unfortunate." The message was one that both religious and secular people could endorse.
{{
cite book}}
: |access-date=
requires |url=
(
help)Reference named "Bunson":
The Council of Tours (567) decreed the 12 days from Christmas to Epiphany to be sacred and especially joyous, thus setting the stage for the celebration of the Lord's birth not only in a liturgical setting but in the hearts of all Christians.
I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 17:20, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps Anupam will revert again, but hopefully with some explanation.
Why did Anupam delete the paragraph about the existence custom of fasting at the start of January that long predated the 567 Council?
Why did delete the statement by Ronald Hutton? - "that, while the Council of Tours declared the 12 days one festal cycle, it confirmed that three of those days were fasting days, dividing the rejoicing days into two blocs." [1]
Was it done because of wanting to keep presenting as serious Wikipedia material the statement that the 567 church council's decisions were intended to overcome a difficulty that the civil authorities of the Roman Empire, to which Tours no longer belonged, were supposed to have had half a millennium earlier about reconciling different different calendars? Which calendar was in use, for instance, in Antioch when John Chrysostom spoke of Christian feasts such as Christmas and Epiphany? That was long before 567. Esoglou ( talk) 21:15, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
I deleted nothing of Anupam's material. Why did Anupam delete mine? What was there in it that was not firmly based on reliable sources? Esoglou ( talk) 21:15, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
References
The lede says that for the catholic church, the season is now a few days longer than 12 days, implying that recently it was only 12 days recently. There are several problems with this statement.
It would be more correct for the sentence to read, "In most of the liturgies of the Roman Catholic Church, the Christmas season is now much shorter than 40 days." Rwflammang ( talk) 02:55, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
My Little Office's title page has, The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary / in Latin and English In Conformity with the the 1961 Editio Typica of the Roman Breviary being that permitted by Summorum Pontificum / Including the Gregorian Chant appointed to be used in the the Office / Baronius Press / London / MMVIII.
The preface by Very Rev. Fr. John Berg, Superior General of the FSSP, says, I am pleased to commend this new edition of the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which adheres to the Editio Typica of the 1961 Breviary…
There follows a lengthy introduction by Theo Keller. Here follow some excerpts.
He then goes on to describe the changes that Pius X made, which were quite minor, and two other variations of the Little Office which were authorized by the Holy See and which were different from the one published in the breviaries, but did not replace it.
Generally speaking, the Little Office seems to be more conservative that the Divine Office.
The edition is a diglot as far as the actually text, but unfortunately the instructions and commentary are in English only, and they do not strike me as strict translations of actual rubrics. The long and the short of it is that the Little Office is divided into three offices:
The antiphon Alma redemptoris mater is said during Advent and Christmastide, but the versicle, response, and oration following the antiphon differ according to season.
Rwflammang ( talk) 02:02, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
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If, as our lede indicates, Christmastide is the same as the Christmas season is the same as Christmas time, then the article is not inclusive enough. The Christmas season begins in America some-time around the Friday after the fourth Thursday in November (for commercially-minded people) and perhaps with the start of advents (for others). Merriam-Webster online defines Christmastime (note the spelling and also that it is not red-lined here). Kdammers ( talk) 14:38, 20 November 2017 (UTC)
"In the English city of Oxford, many Christian families, after attending church, celebrate this period through serving a traditional dish called Boar’s head." Utter nonsense. A quick glance at the quoted reference will reveal that this was not describing what individual families do, but a custom at one of the colleges of the University. Clearly individual families would not be cooking boar's heads, the customs of families in Oxford are unlikely to differ from those in the rest of England, and in any case a book published in 1885 is unlikely to be reliable as a description of present-day customs. -- rossb ( talk) 09:21, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
Upon reading this article, I was surprised to see the Puritans mentioned in the section about antireligious governments. The Wikipedia article on Puritans would lead the casual reader to the conclusion that they were extremely religious since religion is discussed repeatedly in the opening paragraphs. I would also argue that, in the strictest sense, the Nazi party in Germany was not antireligious - while dissenting voices were shut down, this did not apply to religion as a whole. For this reason, I would like to propose removing "antireligious" from the section heading. I do not feel as though it adds anything and do not foresee any negative impact to the article if it were altered. I realise other Wikipedians may have divergent views so I would rather not act unilaterally. Paddyman1989 ( talk) 21:24, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
By 'logic' Please do not stuff up the planet earth. There is no such thing as one tide point all around the earth at year end. 110.175.185.30 ( talk) 23:01, 24 December 2022 (UTC)
There probably should be some reference to the 40 days long Christmastide practiced by Catholics prior to the liturgical reform of Paul VI. 147.178.4.137 ( talk) 20:37, 5 January 2023 (UTC)
The article says that Christmas begins at vespers on December 24th. This is probably correct, but I think it needs more nuance. I won't be the one to make the edit, but I'll just lay out my thoughts below if anyone wants any ideas.
At least with regard to the Catholic Church, there are two different systems of counting time, which are each used for different purposes. The one system counts time from sunset to sunset (this is the one that's used in the Divine Office), and the other counts from midnight to midnight (this I believe is the one used for the Church's fasting/abstinence requirements. And I believe it's also the one used for the Sunday obligation, although the Church does allow Sunday Mass to be "anticipated" on Saturday evening).
So on the one system, Christmas begins with vespers on the 24th; but, on the other system, Christmas begins on the 25th at midnight.
During the liturgical reforms following Vatican II, I think the Divine Office may have switched over to the midnight-to-midnight cycle, in which case the vespers-to-vespers system might not exist anymore. (I'm really not sure.)
In either case, the "feasting" and celebratory nature of Christmas didn't begin until December 25th. This is because Christmas Eve used to be a mandatory day of fasting, and the fast would not end until the reception of Holy Communion at Mass. Even if December 24th vespers is considered "Christmas", the first Mass was never celebrated before midnight (this is on account of the tradition which says that Christ was born at night time).
The fasting is no longer mandatory (apart from the 1-hour communion fast which is something different), and I think Christmas Mass is allowed to be "anticipated" (before midnight), but, generally speaking, I think it's basically the same as it used to be: anything prior to midnight is anticipatory (looking forward to Christ's birth), and everything after midnight is celebratory (celebrating the birth of Christ). 2601:49:8400:26B:10E2:D539:1E94:B623 ( talk) 15:30, 21 December 2023 (UTC)
Please stay calm and civil while commenting or presenting evidence, and do not make personal attacks. Be patient when approaching solutions to any issues. If consensus is not reached, other solutions exist to draw attention and ensure that more editors mediate or comment on the dispute. |
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|
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Christmastide article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
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Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
It has been parodied that the Christmas season is too early. This is understandable, as Christmas related advertisements usually begin these days immediately following Halloween. This breaks the tradition of having Christmastide follow Thanksgiving. In It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown , this is parodied by having a department store all prepared for Christmas during Easter.
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Christmastide's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.
Reference named "Forbes2008":
In 567 the Council of Tours proclaimed that the entire period between Christmas and Epiphany should be considered part of the celebration, creating what became known as the twelve days of Christmas, or what the English called Christmastide. On the last of the twelve days, called Twelfth Night, various cultures developed a wide range of additional special festivities. The variation extends even to the issue of how to count the days. If Christmas Day is the first of the twelve days, then Twelfth Night would be on January 5, the eve of Epiphany. If December 26, the day after Christmas, is the first day, then Twelfth Night falls on January 6, the evening of Epiphany itself. After Christmas and Epiphany were in place, on December 25 and January 6, with the twelve days of Christmas in between, Christians gradually added a period called Advent, as a time of spiritual preparation leading up to Christmas.
{{
cite book}}
: |access-date=
requires |url=
(
help)What Dickens did advocate in his story was "the spirit of Christmas." Sociologist James Barnett has described it as Dickens's "Carol Philosophy," which "combined religious and secular attitudes toward to celebration into a humanitarian pattern. It excoriated individual selfishness and extolled the virtues of brotherhood, kindness, and generosity at Christmas. . . .Dickens preached that at Christmas men should forget self and think of others, especially the poor and the unfortunate." The message was one that both religious and secular people could endorse.
{{
cite book}}
: |access-date=
requires |url=
(
help)Reference named "Bunson":
The Council of Tours (567) decreed the 12 days from Christmas to Epiphany to be sacred and especially joyous, thus setting the stage for the celebration of the Lord's birth not only in a liturgical setting but in the hearts of all Christians.
I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 17:20, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps Anupam will revert again, but hopefully with some explanation.
Why did Anupam delete the paragraph about the existence custom of fasting at the start of January that long predated the 567 Council?
Why did delete the statement by Ronald Hutton? - "that, while the Council of Tours declared the 12 days one festal cycle, it confirmed that three of those days were fasting days, dividing the rejoicing days into two blocs." [1]
Was it done because of wanting to keep presenting as serious Wikipedia material the statement that the 567 church council's decisions were intended to overcome a difficulty that the civil authorities of the Roman Empire, to which Tours no longer belonged, were supposed to have had half a millennium earlier about reconciling different different calendars? Which calendar was in use, for instance, in Antioch when John Chrysostom spoke of Christian feasts such as Christmas and Epiphany? That was long before 567. Esoglou ( talk) 21:15, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
I deleted nothing of Anupam's material. Why did Anupam delete mine? What was there in it that was not firmly based on reliable sources? Esoglou ( talk) 21:15, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
References
The lede says that for the catholic church, the season is now a few days longer than 12 days, implying that recently it was only 12 days recently. There are several problems with this statement.
It would be more correct for the sentence to read, "In most of the liturgies of the Roman Catholic Church, the Christmas season is now much shorter than 40 days." Rwflammang ( talk) 02:55, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
My Little Office's title page has, The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary / in Latin and English In Conformity with the the 1961 Editio Typica of the Roman Breviary being that permitted by Summorum Pontificum / Including the Gregorian Chant appointed to be used in the the Office / Baronius Press / London / MMVIII.
The preface by Very Rev. Fr. John Berg, Superior General of the FSSP, says, I am pleased to commend this new edition of the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which adheres to the Editio Typica of the 1961 Breviary…
There follows a lengthy introduction by Theo Keller. Here follow some excerpts.
He then goes on to describe the changes that Pius X made, which were quite minor, and two other variations of the Little Office which were authorized by the Holy See and which were different from the one published in the breviaries, but did not replace it.
Generally speaking, the Little Office seems to be more conservative that the Divine Office.
The edition is a diglot as far as the actually text, but unfortunately the instructions and commentary are in English only, and they do not strike me as strict translations of actual rubrics. The long and the short of it is that the Little Office is divided into three offices:
The antiphon Alma redemptoris mater is said during Advent and Christmastide, but the versicle, response, and oration following the antiphon differ according to season.
Rwflammang ( talk) 02:02, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Christmastide. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 18 January 2022).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 15:39, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
If, as our lede indicates, Christmastide is the same as the Christmas season is the same as Christmas time, then the article is not inclusive enough. The Christmas season begins in America some-time around the Friday after the fourth Thursday in November (for commercially-minded people) and perhaps with the start of advents (for others). Merriam-Webster online defines Christmastime (note the spelling and also that it is not red-lined here). Kdammers ( talk) 14:38, 20 November 2017 (UTC)
"In the English city of Oxford, many Christian families, after attending church, celebrate this period through serving a traditional dish called Boar’s head." Utter nonsense. A quick glance at the quoted reference will reveal that this was not describing what individual families do, but a custom at one of the colleges of the University. Clearly individual families would not be cooking boar's heads, the customs of families in Oxford are unlikely to differ from those in the rest of England, and in any case a book published in 1885 is unlikely to be reliable as a description of present-day customs. -- rossb ( talk) 09:21, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
Upon reading this article, I was surprised to see the Puritans mentioned in the section about antireligious governments. The Wikipedia article on Puritans would lead the casual reader to the conclusion that they were extremely religious since religion is discussed repeatedly in the opening paragraphs. I would also argue that, in the strictest sense, the Nazi party in Germany was not antireligious - while dissenting voices were shut down, this did not apply to religion as a whole. For this reason, I would like to propose removing "antireligious" from the section heading. I do not feel as though it adds anything and do not foresee any negative impact to the article if it were altered. I realise other Wikipedians may have divergent views so I would rather not act unilaterally. Paddyman1989 ( talk) 21:24, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
By 'logic' Please do not stuff up the planet earth. There is no such thing as one tide point all around the earth at year end. 110.175.185.30 ( talk) 23:01, 24 December 2022 (UTC)
There probably should be some reference to the 40 days long Christmastide practiced by Catholics prior to the liturgical reform of Paul VI. 147.178.4.137 ( talk) 20:37, 5 January 2023 (UTC)
The article says that Christmas begins at vespers on December 24th. This is probably correct, but I think it needs more nuance. I won't be the one to make the edit, but I'll just lay out my thoughts below if anyone wants any ideas.
At least with regard to the Catholic Church, there are two different systems of counting time, which are each used for different purposes. The one system counts time from sunset to sunset (this is the one that's used in the Divine Office), and the other counts from midnight to midnight (this I believe is the one used for the Church's fasting/abstinence requirements. And I believe it's also the one used for the Sunday obligation, although the Church does allow Sunday Mass to be "anticipated" on Saturday evening).
So on the one system, Christmas begins with vespers on the 24th; but, on the other system, Christmas begins on the 25th at midnight.
During the liturgical reforms following Vatican II, I think the Divine Office may have switched over to the midnight-to-midnight cycle, in which case the vespers-to-vespers system might not exist anymore. (I'm really not sure.)
In either case, the "feasting" and celebratory nature of Christmas didn't begin until December 25th. This is because Christmas Eve used to be a mandatory day of fasting, and the fast would not end until the reception of Holy Communion at Mass. Even if December 24th vespers is considered "Christmas", the first Mass was never celebrated before midnight (this is on account of the tradition which says that Christ was born at night time).
The fasting is no longer mandatory (apart from the 1-hour communion fast which is something different), and I think Christmas Mass is allowed to be "anticipated" (before midnight), but, generally speaking, I think it's basically the same as it used to be: anything prior to midnight is anticipatory (looking forward to Christ's birth), and everything after midnight is celebratory (celebrating the birth of Christ). 2601:49:8400:26B:10E2:D539:1E94:B623 ( talk) 15:30, 21 December 2023 (UTC)