Christmas, Dec 25th. Is the renaming of the ancient and long held pagan celebration for the Winter Solstice. The solstice is the point in the Earth's orbit around the sun where the northern hemisphere experiences the least light from the sun. This point was celebrated as it marks the beginning of the path back towards the light and the life giving warmth of the sun. I'm sure you can see how these terms can have mystical, religious, and supertsitious connotations.
The solstice is really the true end of one year and the true start of the next, in as much as any point on a circle (orbit) could be considered a start point. Man's inability over the millenia to accurately measure planetary motions has led to the real start of the year now being some 10 days away from the official Jan 1. But for a very long time the solstice was considered Dec 25th and that was the case when Christianity tried to replace pagan traditions.
We now have the strange case where Dec 25th is now a random Christian date celebrated largely through pagan traditions, e.g. the little fir trees people put in their homes, strange decorations, lights, holly, yule logs, misteltoe, berries, etc, etc - all pagan, and a new year celebartion on Dec 31, and the real actual event of the solstice on Dec 21 largely ignored.
Pity. I kinda like having a real purpose behind a celebration rather than "offical dates", superstitions, and religious hogwash.
So today, Dec 21st/22nd I will be holding my own private celebration knowing that I am closer to a factual truth than most of the world.
The actual time this year is Sat., Dec. 22, 2007, 1:08 A.M. EST (06:08 UT)