HAPPY SOLSTICE the original winter holiday. 

Well of course Soltice should about now or  tomorrow,the beginning of winter.

Celebration of the birth of Jesus isdifferent. And there is no national holiday for soltice,but there is for Christmas,a mass for Christ.

But I am saying things that everyone knows. I hope you were talking about me ranting. I think Congress was not in a hurry to celebrate the beginning of the winter sun ,but I would bet most of them are going home to be with their families, go to church, see santa,or whatever, They will also enjoy the pay they get for having a religious holiday off.

In any case, they are screw ups. But Merry Christmas or Happy happy Hanukkah and I hope everyone enjoys the winter sun.

Margaretellen says ...

By the way, what do non Christians call Christmas day? Holiday day? Shameful, shameful

I do not know about other non Christians, but I call Christmas day Christmas Day. I do not have to put down the Christian religion to believe in a non Christian, non traditional religion. I also do not have to use a different term for an established holiday. I respect all religions, their special days and holidays. 

Also, what is so shameful about not being a Christian? There are more non Christians in this world than there are Christians.

Sorry, but the last 3 hospitals that I worked for did not have Easter as a paid holiday.  The one that I work for now is union, and nationally recognized, no Easter holiday pay.

I made really good use of the Winter Solstace.  What better day to get married on, but the one with the longest night of the year......LOL, December 21st is my wedding anniversary. 

You know it depends on the hospital business and schools etc. Even the stock market is closed is closed

Children here get about 2-7 days off according to which school.

It is a Holy day after all, changed to holiday.

Um just so we understand a little more about Easter since somehow my name was linked to a comment about Easter.  we can believe differently yet all want to do unto otheres as others would do unto you and love our brother as ourself.  Pretty basic universal teachings. So now Merry Christmas!

Many, perhaps most, Pagan religions in the Mediterranean area had a major seasonal day of religious celebration at or following the Spring Equinox. Cybele, the Phrygian fertility goddess, had a fictional consort who was believed to have been born via a virgin birth. He was Attis, who was believed to have died and been resurrected each year during the period MAR-22 to MAR-25. "About 200 B.C. mystery cults began to appear in Rome just as they had earlier in Greece. Most notable was the Cybele cult centered on Vatican hill ...Associated with the Cybele cult was that of her lover, Attis (the older Tammuz, Osiris, Dionysus, or Orpheus under a new name). He was a god of ever-reviving vegetation. Born of a virgin, he died and was reborn annually. The festival began as a day of blood on Black Friday and culminated after three days in a day of rejoicing over the resurrection." 3

Wherever Christian worship of Jesus and Pagan worship of Attis were active in the same geographical area in ancient times, Christians "used to celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus on the same date; and pagans and Christians used to quarrel bitterly about which of their gods was the true prototype and which the imitation."

Many religious historians believe that the death and resurrection legends were first associated with Attis, many centuries before the birth of Jesus. They were simply grafted onto stories of Jesus' life in order to make Christian theology more acceptable to Pagans. Others suggest that many of the events in Jesus' life that were recorded in the gospels were lifted from the life of Krishna, the second person of the Hindu Trinity. Ancient Christians had an alternative explanation; they claimed that Satan had created counterfeit deities in advance of the coming of Christ in order to confuse humanity. 4 Modern-day Christians generally regard the Attis legend as being a Pagan myth of little value. They regard Jesus' death and resurrection account as being true, and unrelated to the earlier tradition.

Wiccans and other modern-day Neopagans continue to celebrate the Spring Equinox as one of their 8 yearly Sabbats (holy days of celebration). Near the Mediterranean, this is a time of sprouting of the summer's crop; farther north, it is the time for seeding. Their rituals at the Spring Equinox are related primarily to the fertility of the crops and to the balance of the day and night times. Where Wiccans can safely celebrate the Sabbat out of doors without threat of religious persecution, they often incorporate a bonfire into their rituals, jumping over the dying embers is believed to assure fertility of people and crops.

It seems that this particular forum has gone too 'off topic' too continue. Arguing about Christmas and Easter instead of debating the Health Care Reform Debacle of 2009?

 The 'universal healthcare' bill is out of everyone's hands now except those in the Senate whose palms are being greased in exchange for their votes.  The political goal is to push the damned thing through NOW so that we don't have to deal with its effects until after the next election is over in 2010.  Pelosi and Company plan to be reelected so that they can further 'socialize' this country to a point where we won't recognize the America that we all used to know.

Maybe Obama AND Al Gore can win more Nobel Prizes and such by then...

I feel like Charlie Brown in the classroom, Wawawa,wawa,wa----wawa socialism wa wa w a--ruin country , wawawa --wawawwa.

Same tune in almost every post.  Give me new ideas on the right, give us some solutions, give us compromise, give us democracy instead of shut down debate, no new ideas, and rhetoric.  Please move this country forward and not backward.  Yes the bill is flawed because no one has the balls to go for single payer care in this country.  No one can get medicare for 55 and older buy in done either.  the right has to throw in abortion into every bill they can, no one was going to use federal dollars for abortion yet they had to get their hands in it and tie it up further.

I want our Senate to start working instead of praying for people to die so they can kill the bill.  Hooray for the nurses who are standing up against the bill because it only perpetuates the flawed and costly system with real detriment to their patients. 

OK.  Once and for all: NOBODY who is remotely human CAN produce something that is perfect.  However, this mess of paper that the Congress calls a 'bill' has not been thought out, debated, presented in a way that the public can understand or approve of, or even READ by our supposed representatives in D.C.

For the Congress to be in such a balls-to-the-wall hurry to 'deliver' on this vote before Christmas is an abomination of the legislative process.  They should ALL be thrown out who have pushed this thing to this point.  Remember, we vote with our ballot AND our money.  Let us not forget those who have pushed to propagate this Socialist agenda upon all Americans, the majority of whom are OPPOSED to it according to such respected polling organizations as Gallup and others.

And the mainstream media, which elected these traitors along with the ignorant voters who just wanted 'change' at any cost are now finding that some prices are too high to pay.  The ONLY way to finance things that we cannot afford is to raise taxes, and we all know who will end up paying them! 

And so this little 'Christmas present' that the administration and the liberal members of Congress and the media are so determined to shove down our throats deserves only one comment:  BAH, HUMBUG!

I hope everyone knows that the Health Care Reform Bill is going to be passed.  Will it work? Well I am doubtful that it will, but at least it is an idea to get some health coverage for so many that do not have it.  Rnprogressive makes a joke about Charlie brown, but it is true. Ask any of the opponents of the Health Care Reform to give  a valid and possible alternative and they do not give any, they just cry "Socialism". Wawawa.........lol. (I liked that Rnprogressive).  Well if you really think that this country will go socialist, you might want to study what socialism is. Having a health care system that helps everyone is not socialism. It is also not even socialized medicine.

Kittyrn says ...

so·cial·ism    (ssh-lzm) KEY 

NOUN:

1. Any of various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and controls the economy.


2. The stage in Marxist-Leninist theory intermediate between capitalism and communism, in which collective ownership of the economy under the dictatorship of the proletariat has not yet been successfully achieved. 

Thank you for the definitions Kittyrn......you have proven, whether you meant to or not, that this is not a socialized country with the above.

1. The production and distribution of goods is not owned collectively or by a centralized government. That goes for the Health Care Reform Bill. It has provisions for people to use their current insurance companies. That is not socialism.

2.  We are no way in an intermediate stage between capitalism and communism. We are still on a capitalist system pure and simple.

1.  The government was attempting to run car companies

2.  The government was running banks

3.  The government wanted to run 16% of the National Economy.

If you can't see that as Socialism, than you are blind.  And before you say, well they (banks and car companies) were running it badly, that happens in both the private sector and the public sector.  Ups and Downs,  any company that was running itself badly, should have been allowed to run itself right out of business.

Hey all - Since the Senate just passed their version of the health care reform bill, I'm taking the opportunity to close out this thread and refocus the conversation in a new one. You can continue the conversation here.