Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve, observed on December 24, is a significant day that blends both religious and secular traditions as it prepares for Christmas Day. This day marks the conclusion of the Advent season, which involves anticipation and preparation for the celebration of Jesus' birth. Many Christians partake in worship services, often held at midnight, where traditional hymns and carols such as “Silent Night” and “Joy to the World” are sung. A notable historical setting for these religious observances is Bethlehem, believed to be the birthplace of Jesus, where the Church of the Nativity attracts many visitors. In the United States, Christmas Eve is characterized by family gatherings, festive decorations, and various customs, including the exchange of gifts, which reflect the story of the Three Wise Men. The figure of Santa Claus, popularized in the 19th century, plays a central role in many American celebrations, bringing joy to children who eagerly await his arrival. Overall, Christmas Eve serves as a time of reflection, joy, and family connection, embraced by diverse cultural practices and beliefs.
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Christmas Eve
Like the celebration of Christmas Day, the observance of Christmas Eve, or the Vigil of Christmas, on December 24 is a combination of the religious and the secular. December 24, which is primarily a day of preparation for Christmas, is the culmination of the pre-Christmas Advent season, namely that period of anticipation and preparation that begins approximately four weeks earlier.
The focal point of the Christmas Eve religious celebration is the service of worship held by Christians of all denominations. Some of the services begin at midnight, in correspondence with the assertion by many that Jesus was born at or near this hour. Choral pieces, such as selections from George Frederick Handel's Messiah, are often presented and traditional Christmas carols are often sung. Some of the carols whose titles most typify the gladness of the occasion are "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing," "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "Joy to the World," "O Come, All Ye Faithful," and probably the best-known of all, "Silent Night."
For centuries, the major religious observance on Christmas Eve has been celebrated in the small town of Bethlehem, located only a few miles from Jerusalem in an area that was part of the original biblical land of Palestine. Traditionally known as the birthplace of Jesus, the town was regarded as a holy spot by Christians as early as the second century. Constantine the Great, who in the early fourth century was the first Roman emperor to embrace Christianity, had a church built on the site asserted to be Jesus' birthplace. The original structure of the Church of the Nativity, completed in 333, later underwent many transformations, especially under the sixth-century Roman emperor Justinian. Disruptive quarrels for control of the sanctuary wracked the various Christian churches for hundreds of years.
In the United States, Christmas Eve is an occasion for family gatherings, for Christmas lights, decorated Christmas trees, and the hanging of stockings from fireplace mantels by small children who hope they will be filled with gifts by Santa Claus before Christmas morning. In some American families, often those whose children have grown up, Christmas Eve rather than the more customary Christmas Day is the time for the exchange of Christmas gifts. These gifts stem from the tale of the Three Wise Men who, according to the biblical account, brought gifts to honor the infant Jesus.
In the early 1860s the cartoonist Thomas Nast drew a depiction of Santa Claus for Harper's Illustrated Weekly that has essentially set the tone ever since: a round, bearded figure with a red fur-trimmed suit, wide leather belt, and shiny boots. Nast's caricature was so popular that he continued to depict various scenes with Santa Claus every Christmas for nearly thirty years. As children grow older, however, they begin to have doubts about the legend of Santa Claus. In 1897 one child wrote to the New York Sun, asking whether there is a Santa Claus. The answer, written by Francis P. Church and printed as an editorial, has become famous as "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus." It read:
We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of the Sun: Dear Editor: I am eight years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says "If you see it in the Sun it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus? Virginia O'Hanlon Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished. Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world. You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding. No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
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