,<\/em> when Pope Julius declared December 25 as the date to celebrate Christ\u2019s birth, he integrated \u201cit with a Roman solstice festival celebrating the \u2018Birthday of the Unconquered Sun.\u2019 The Roman birthday of the sun became the Christian birthday of the Son.\u201d<\/p>\nThat last sentence isn\u2019t just a cute turn of phrase. It symbolizes the subversive quality of Christmas.<\/p>\n
The \u201cUnconquered Sun,\u201d or Sol Invictus<\/em>, represents the Ancient Roman theological and political ways of life. The Unconquered Sun was a patron god of Roman soldiers. Rome promised peace, known as the Pax Romana<\/em>, and Rome had a method to achieve this goal \u2013 through violent conquest. To celebrate the birthday of the \u201cUnconquered Sun\u201d was to celebrate Roman peace, but it was also to celebrate the violence of Roman conquest.<\/p>\nFor example, after Emperor Aurelian defeated his enemies and re-united the Roman Empire in 275 A.D., he elevated the \u201cUnconquered Sun\u201d as the primary god of the Roman pantheon. He united the Empire behind this god and built a new temple in Rome dedicated to worshiping the Sun god.<\/p>\n
Emperor Aurelian\u2019s reforms were symbolic of Roman imperial theology at its core: the gods wanted peace and peace was achieved through violent conquest. December 25, the birthday of the \u201cUnconquered Sun,\u201d was a celebration of the god who brought peace through conquest.<\/p>\n
So when Pope Julius declared December 25 to be Christ\u2019s birthday, he subverted the whole Roman imperial theological system.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s true that the Christian Son of God and the Roman \u201cUnconquered Sun\u201d promised the same thing \u2013 peace. The difference is their method to achieving peace.<\/p>\n
Whereas Roman imperial theology promised peace through political conquest, Jesus promised peace through nonviolent love. Jesus reveals an entirely different theological and political system. He showed that God\u2019s way to peace, the \u201cKingdom of God,\u201d isn\u2019t achieved through the violent methods of the \u201cUnconquered Sun,\u201d but through the self-sacrificial and nonviolent love of the \u201cConquered Son.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jesus wasn\u2019t born simply to tell us to love one another. He wasn\u2019t executed on a Roman cross simply because he preached a message of love. Nor was he resurrected to conquer those who killed him. He was born, he was killed, and he rose again to subvert the whole theological and political system of violence with God\u2019s nonviolent love. He reveals the absurdity of believing that the means of violence can achieve the goal of peace. As Borg and Crossan write, the \u201cterrible truth is that our world has never established peace through victory. Victory establishes not peace, but lull. Thereafter, violence returns once again, and always worse than before. And it is that escalator violence that endangers our world.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why Christmas is subversive. December 25 demands that we make a theological and political decision. We will either decide to follow the \u201cUnconquered Sun\u201d who falsely promises peace through violence, or we will follow Jesus, the \u201cConquered Son,\u201d who brings peace through self-sacrificial and nonviolent love.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Christmas is a time for celebration, joy, and family. But Christmas is much more than a sentimental holiday. Christmas is subversive. The Bible doesn\u2019t tell us the specific date Jesus was born. Later Christians tradition gave us the date of December 25. It was chosen by Pope Julius around the year 350 and Christians have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1651,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[43,107,538,537,137,536,198,205],"class_list":["post-2070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-christmas","tag-jesus","tag-john-dominic-crossan","tag-marcus-borg","tag-nonviolence","tag-roman-empire","tag-theology","tag-violence"],"yoast_head":"\n
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