Music,food, cookies, candy, family gatherings, friends, decorated trees, lots of colored lights, sappy movies, gifts given and received, I love it all without a thought of religion. Celebrating the beginning of Winter. Bringing light and happiness to the cold,dark days of December.

Why not? Christmas was a pagan holiday that was church-washed, and the Messiah is a brilliant piece of polyphonic music that is so fun to sing with a huge choir.

I love Christmas. I celebrate a very secular version, but with all the music. All of it.

I will be singing the Messiah on Sunday in Belfast. I will also be singing Carols at a Retirement Home this Saturday and performing in two Carol Concerts at our local theatre on Thursday and Friday of next week. It is all really great fun, and in the case of Handel’s Messiah exhilarating to sing such a masterpiece of music. As far as Xmas itself, we have always enjoyed it in the same way as everyone else, by eating, drinking and giving presents, despite being raised as a totally atheist family.

Good music is good music.

Lots of us do still celebrate Christmas even if we don’t buy the mythology

I perform The Messiah as a member of a choir that hires a chamber orchestra nearly every year. It is a beautiful peice of music that reveals something new to me every year. It brings large group of people togeter in a beautiful way. This is what gives life meaning regardless of religius affiliation.

I LOVE the Xmas season! To me it has NOTHING to do with religion, and EVERYTHING to do with gifts, food, family, lights, and music. Oh, and the Krampus! Hail Krampus!!

I too like the Christmas holiday much of the music. For me it's more about bringing back great childhood memories and enjoying the somewhat better general feeling that the season seems to bring about,.

I have said it before here. I think of the the time from Thanksgiving to NYD as one holiday. I do some small decorations and play Christmas music. Nothing religious. Everything from Perry Como to Diana Krall. It all makes me feel good, No sadness.
Whatever someone does is their business.

I myself do not, it starts as a festival of greed now ( Thankless Takingday / Black Friday ), and runs on for a month long blitz of selling people things they don't need on funds they don't really have.

I am also Atheist and love Xmas!
No Nativity stuff, but always a Xmas tree...
People seem happier and nicer to everyone.....and seem to have more tolerance...lol . For us...proud ATHEISTS
Happy Holidays my friends

Good music is good music, no matter what its origin or purpose. Same holds true for any art.

Beautiful composition, did you know that Handel wrote the whole thing in a little over a week?

I drink and I know things

I like the holidays season because of family reunion, food and more. Since I got off the catholic religion the tree and ornaments arrangement has been changed. I put my pagan tree and I like to decorate it with family pictures and others homemade decorations. I adopted a new holiday "Winter Secular Solstice" celebration.

That is a favorite of mine as well.
There are plenty of pieces that were inspired by a composers love of God. To me that doesn't take away from it's musical beauty, just because I am a non believer.

If it makes you happy .

I am totally apatheist but also a classical music lover. When you understand the society in which Handel lived, the genius of the Messiah is breathtaking. One of the most difficult pieces I have ever sung and I love to sing it.

I love this time of year! The family, friends, food, lights, music, weather. I don’t like getting gifs, and I’m not a fan of shopping, but the rest of it is alright. HAPPY SATURNALIA!

christmas is a wonderful holiday. aside from the commercialism I love the christmas season. it's just a made-up holiday. but it has a good meaning - love.

It used to be my favorite as well. But lately, with the clear attack on our nation and the hypocrisy of their so-called morals, I and a few others, have become anti-theists and religious music has really lost it's appeal.

I will be finding & attending a Messiah Sing this month! Just Great!

"Christmas" predates Christianity by millennia. Since prehistory, the winter solstice has been seen as a significant time of year in many cultures and has been marked by festivals and rituals. On the Julian calendar, which the Romans used, the winter solstice fell on December 25. On 25 December AD 274, the Roman emperor Aurelian made it the date of the festival of Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, or "the birth of the unconquerable sun". The earliest known reference to it commemorating the birth of Christ on December 25th is in the Roman Philocalian calendar of AD 354. The last inscription referring to Sol Invictus dates to AD 387, and there were enough devotees in the fifth century that the Christian theologian Augustine found it necessary to preach against them. Therefore, who would the Romans call "the Grinch"? Jesus! LOL

Me also, nothing wrong with spreading peace and goodwill to all. All grandchildren are grown so the marketing of the holiday has slowed down, at least for me.