DECEMBER 25
WHEN WAS CHRIST BORN? DEBATES ABOUT CHRISTMAS (336)
“Christmas Day, 1882. Gordon very ill in bed. Ashe and Wise tottering out of fever beds I myself just about to totter in again. In spite of our poor co...”
Dawson, F.C. James Hannington, D.D., F.L.S., F.R.G.S., First Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa. Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs & Company, n.d.
Contemplate Christ this Christmas Day (1862)
Unto us a child is born—Isaiah 9:6 (KJV). Let us contemplate the child Jesus, the circumstances of his birth, and...
Events
336
First recorded instance of Jesus’ nativity celebrated as a feast on December 25, appears in the Calendar of Filocalus (or Philocalus).
Authority for the date: Encyclopedia Britannica.508
(or as early as 496) King Clovis, who united Gaul and founded France, is baptized by St. Remigius in the Cathedral of Rheims with three thousand of his warriors. His wife Clotilda was instrumental in “converting” him, although his understanding was low and his change of character minimal.
Authority for the date: Shanzer, Danuta. “Dating the Baptism of Clovis.” Early Medieval Europe (March 1998).597
Thousands of Anglo-Saxons are baptized by the missionary Augustine, an important date in the Christianization of Southern England.
Authority for the date: Britannica.1572
Death of Peter Melius Juhász, a Hungarian reformer and religious writer. He had been active and prominent as bishop of the Calvinist Reformed Church in Transylvania, but also produced an early botanical and medicinal work in the Hungarian lanaguge.
Authority for the date: Betz, Hans Dieter, et al. Religion Past and Present.1625
Metrophanes Kritopoulos, an Eastern Orthodox priest traveling on behalf of the Patriarch of Constantinople, delivers a speech at the University of Altdorf to foster goodwill between Protestants and the Orthodox and explain how the eastern church looks at Christianity.
Authority for the date: Colin Davey, “Metrophanes Kritopoulos, Pioneer for Unity.”1821
James Montgomery’s Christmas carol, “Angels from the Realms of Glory,” is first used in a public service, despite having been written in 1816. It is sung at the English Moravian center in Fulneck, Yorkshire, England.
Authority for the date: Ernest K. Emurian, Stories of Christmas Carols.1866
Death in Alexandria, Virginia, of Baptist hymn writer Mary Ann Collier, author of the hymn “The Sun That Lights Yon Broad Blue Sky.”
Authority for the date: Baptist Hymnwriters.1898
The first continental council of the Latin American Roman Catholic Church is convened. It issues 998 canons. Among its objects is a desire to check anti-Christian influences. Thirteen archbishops and forty-one bishops are present at this meeting in Rome.
Authority for the date: Dussel, Enrique. A History of the Church in Latin America. Eerdmans, 1981.1905
Death in Athens of Apostolos Makrakis, who had often been embroiled with the Greek Orthodox Church but was popular with middle class Christians. He had considered himself chosen to liberate Byzantium from the Turks and to renovate the church. Not only had he preached controversial sermons on Christ throughout Greece, but he condemned Freemasonry, materialism, and the buying and selling of church positions. Local councils twice condemned him to prison.
Authority for the date: orthodoxwiki.org.1909
Japanese evangelist Toyohiko Kagawa crosses the Higurashi Bridge to serve in the slums of Shinkawa. His most quoted saying is, “Theology is but an appendix to love, and an unreliable appendix!”
Authority for the date: Davey, Cyril. Kagawa of Japan. London: Epworth, 1960.1911
Dedication of Dom Evangelina in Petrograd, the largest evangelical house of worship in Russia.
Authority for the date: Oswald A. Blumit, Sentenced to Siberia.2011
Islamic terrorists bomb Nigerian churches in Madalla, Jos, Kano, Damaturu, and Gadaka, killing dozens of Christians during Christmas services.
Authority for the date: http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/25/world/africa/nigeria-church-bombing/index.html