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Christmas, which celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ, is one of the most important holidays for Christians. After Christ’s death, he rose back to life. His death and resurrection provide a way by which people can be reconciled with God. In remembrance of Jesus’ death and resurrection, the cross serves as a fundamental symbol in Christianity.

The first celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ on December 25 took place in Rome about the middle of the fourth century, although the Eastern church was already observing January 6 as a joint commemoration of Jesus’ birth and baptism. Even in pre-Christian times, the period between December 25 and January 6 was considered a special time of year. Now widely referred to as “The Twelve Days of Christmas”, this was a time when spirits roamed the earth and were apt to cause mischief if certain precautions weren’t taken. A number of the superstitions associated with this period concerned spinning.

Xmas, the common abbreviation for Christmas, is regarded by many—especially those who are intent on preserving the holiday’s religious roots and traditions—as an insult to Christ, if not a sacrilege. In fact, the abbreviation is entirely appropriate. The letter “X” （chi） is the first letter in the Greek word for Christ. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, there was an even longer abbreviation that came into use around 1550: X’temmas.

Images of angels adorn Nativity scenes, Christmas cards, Christmas trees, and other Christmas displays. These otherworldly beings take their name from the Greek angelos, which means “messenger” or “herald”. In the Gospel according to Luke’s account of Jesus’ birth, it is an angel named Gabriel who visits Mary to inform her that she will bear a child. Then, on the night of Jesus’ birth, an angel appears to shepherds in a nearby field to announce the glorious event—followed by a “multitude” of angels who suddenly materialize behind the first angel, singing praises to God.

With so many angels involved in orchestrating the events surrounding Jesus’ birth, it is no wonder that they became a symbol of the Christmas holiday. Today’s Christmas angels frequently appear as winged human beings in flowing white robes with feminine faces and haloes.

The association between bells and Christmas can be traced back to the Middle Ages, when Church officials began to use bells for worship and celebration. Large bells were used to call parishioners to religious services, and they also chimed at certain points during the service so that those who were not inside the church could join in the prayers. Many churches had four or five bells; the more important the occasion, the more bells rang to honor it. Today, fewer churches carry out the old Christmas tradition of bell-ringing, and the folklore surrounding bells has been largely forgotten. Nevertheless, the public imagination still links bells with Christmas. A number of well-known Christmas poems and Christmas carols mention pealing or jingling bells as emblems of the holiday. In addition, bells appear as symbols of the holiday on many Christmas decorations. And representatives of charitable organizations, such as the Salvation Army, who are seeking donations often announce their presence on street corners by ringing hand-held bells.

Perhaps because the ancient Celts supplied the rest of Europe with pork and bacon, the boar’s association with the Yuletide feast goes back to prehistoric times. According to Norse folklore, boar was served in Valhalla, the mythical hall where Odin received the souls of heroes who had fallen in battle. Pork was highly prized in Ireland and Wales, where many preferred it to beef and mutton.

The very earliest Christmas trees were decorated with symbols associated with the birthof Jesus. Candles were used to symbolize Christ, the Light of the World, and the star placed on the topmost branch recalled the Star of Bethlehem that shone over the manger. The shepherd’s crook represented the shepherds in the fields near Bethlehem, who were the first to receive the news that a Savior had been born.

In ancient Rome, it was customary to exchange greetings and gifts on the first day of January. The first printed Christmas card was produced in England in 1843. Designed by John Calcott Horsley, it sold for a shilling and looked like a postcard. It wasn’t until the 1880s that cards became folders of four, eight, or more pages.

Louis Prang started producing Christmas cards in the United States in 1875. His plant in Roxbury, Massachusetts, was the birthplace of what is now the American greeting card industry. Christmas cards in America today are so much a part of the holiday tradition that people often regard sending them as a burden. And fear of offending the sensibilities of non-Christians has led many card manufacturers to omit the word “Christmas” altogether, substituting more secular messages focusing on world peace and understanding.

Although it is difficult to imagine the holiday season without Christmas carols, Christmas was observed for more than 800 years before the first real “carols” were written. The term originally referred to a ring-dance accompanied by singing, without any religious overtones. Eventually it came to mean a merry song with a tune that could be danced to.

Christmas caroling—the custom of singing carols in a group while moving from house to house—originally took place on Christmas Eve or early in the morning on Christmas Day. Today it is a popular Christmas Eve tradition. Since the nineteenth century, carols have been sung in place of hymns in most churches on Christmas Day. Although some very good carols have been written for holidays other than Christmas, no one ever seems to sing them.

Many people embellish the Christmas cards, letters, and packages they send during the holiday season with special decorative stamps called Christmas seals. Although the seals have no value as postage, the money collected in return for them supports various charitable causes. A Danish postmaster came up with the idea for Christmas seals in 1904, and since then the custom has spread to dozens of countries around the world. In 1919 the National Tuberculosis Association, which later became the American Lung Association, cornered the market on Christmas seals⁴in the United States, becoming the sole issuers of the decorative stamps inthis country. Today, the seals earn millions of dollars a year for the American Lung Association.

The Christmas tree as it is known today came to America from Germany in the early eighteenth century. Although Christmas trees can be seen everywhere in the United States—in homes, schools, office buildings, and shopping malls—they do not play the central role here that they do in the German celebration of Christmas. No one in Germany is too poor or too lonely to put up a tree. And unlike Americans, who tend to arrange their Christmas gifts around the base of the tree, the Germans consider their tree an object of wonder all by itself. It is decorated in secret behind closed doors and revealed to the assembled family and guests on Christmas Eve.

In the United States today a fir tree is traditionally placed at the highest point of a building under construction—even if it’s a skyscraper. Just as Christmas celebrates the birth of Christ, the occupational symbol of the fir tree serves as a reminder of the work that goes into a new building and the people who make this modern “miracle” possible.

The crèche, a display of a stable with figures representing the Nativity scene, is usually attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, who used real people and live animals to reconstruct the birth of Jesus in a cave near the Italian village of Greccio in 1224. The “living pantomime”became a popular Italian custom and eventually spread throughout the Christian world.

There has been some controversy in the United States about erecting crèches in public places, such as town halls. State and local governments have been under pressure to make their displays non-denominational by adding other symbolic elements. Vandalism and theft of the figures in the crèche are becoming increasingly common, prompting some cities and towns to do away with outdoor Nativity scenes altogether.

In the American Southwest, glowing paper sacks decorate the outlines of buildings, patios, walkways, and plazas at night during the Christmas season. These ornamental lights are called farolitos （pronounced fah-roh-LEE-tohs）, which means “little lanterns” in Spanish. They are made by filling brown paper lunch bags with a few inches of sand to weigh the bags down and to anchor the votive candles that sit inside. When the candles are lit, the light shining through the brown paper gives off a golden glow in the darkness.

Although farolitos came to the Southwest from Mexico, they are believed to have derivedfrom Chinese paper lanterns, imported from the Philippines to Mexico by Spanish traders. Today these beautiful lights constitute an important symbol of Christmas in the American Southwest.

In some areas of the Southwest, farolitos are known as luminarias, while in others the two customs remain distinct. In northern New Mexico, for example, the word “luminarias” refers to small Christmas season bonfires, while the decorative brown paper lanterns are known as farolitos.

Father Christmas is an English folk figure who for centuries personified the Christmas season. Unlike Santa Claus, Father Christmas did not distribute gifts. Instead, he represented the mirth, generosity, and abundance associated with the celebration of Christmas.

Father Christmas usually appeared as a large, robust man wearing a red or green robe with fur trim and a crown of holly, ivy, or mistletoe. During the nineteenth century, the American Santa Claus began to appear in England. Santa Claus was a gift-bringer rather than a personification of the Christmas season, but as his popularity increased in England, his identity began to merge with that of Father Christmas. Eventually Santa Claus all but erased the figure of Father Christmas, who retained his name but whose image and activities nearly mirrored those of Santa Claus.

The custom of exchanging charms or small tokens of good luck at the end of the year goes back to very ancient times. St. Nicholas, the Bishop of Myra, has also been linked to the gift-giving tradition. Because he was not only wealthy but modest, he liked to help people in need without drawing attention to himself. Poor families would often find a gold piece or a well-filled purse without knowing where it had come from. His American successor, Santa Claus, carried on the tradition by delivering gifts in his sleigh on Christmas Eve.

The growing commercialism surrounding Christmas, particularly in the United States, has placed so much emphasis on shopping for Christmas gifts that many people feel it has robbed the holiday of its religious significance. A popular slogan reminds busy American consumers to “Put the ‘Christ’ back in Christmas”.

1. Janus贾纳斯，是古代罗马神话中的两面神。

2. Abnaki Indians阿布纳基印第安人，为美洲土著人之一，主要居住于美国缅因州、加拿大魁北克南部等地方。

3. Wampanoag万帕诺亚格人，为美洲土著人之一，主要居住在美国马萨诸塞州一带。

4. Christmas seals防痨邮票，慈善机构印发的彩色小票，圣诞季节贴于信封上。

I. Fill in the blanks according to the text.

1. Today, New Year’s Day is geared toward _________ and ________________. Almost everywhere it is a day for receiving visitors and recovering from New Year’s Eve festivities.

2. U.S. Representative ___________ from Michigan called for a federal holiday honoring Dr. King.

3. _________, Virginia, was the first town to sponsor a public celebration of George Washington’s birthday, in 1782.

4. The colors of American flag carry their own symbolic meanings: Red stands for ________, white for _____________________, and blue for _________________.

5. ____________ is the national bird of the United States and one of the largest birds in the world.

6. ___________________ was known as Remembrance Day in England and Canada and Armistice Day in the United States, or sometimes Victory Day.

7. The Pilgrims’ Thanksgiving can be traced back to _____________________ and Dutch thanksgiving traditions, which some Pilgrims learned about during the ten years they spent in the city of Leyden before coming to America.

8. ________________ has long symbolized America’s freedom. During the Revolutionary War, the residents of Plymouth took it as a good omen rather than a coincidence when the rock split in two while being pried from its bed for use as a pedestal for a liberty pole: shortly after, the colonies officially split from England.

9. _____________, the common abbreviation for Christmas, is regarded by many—especially those who are intent on preserving the holiday’s religious roots and traditions—as an insult to Christ, if not a sacrilege.

II. Define the following terms.

1. the New Year’s resolutions

III. Questions for discussion.

1. Where was the first place to celebrate George Washington’s birthday? How did it happen?

2. How did the Memorial Day become a national holiday?

3. What about the picnics on Labor Day in America?

4. When did the first “official” Thanksgiving take place in America? What about it?