Quotes from Joseph Kelly

because Christians believed that the death of a holy person was a new birth in heaven, and they honored that date.

It was agreed upon," Percy wrote, speaking in the passive voice of a decision that ought to have been his alone, "to put the children to death, the which was effected by throwing them overboard and shooting out their brains in the water." This

Many people think that the church simply took over a pagan holiday, but that is not so. As Sextus Julius Africanus had shown, there were good reasons for celebrating the feast of Christ's birth on December 25, and sun and light symbolism played a very great role in Christian worship.