Quote: Pariah said:Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Christ with a trivial tree inserted into the holiday customs by commercialist culture. Nowhere in the Christian doctrine does it dictate that trees and presents are a why of celebrating Christmas (although technically, the giving and being generous part can be considered as such). Same thing goes for the Easter Bunny. Nowhere is it said by Christians that the Easter Bunny is some sort of holy symbol. The candy companies merely capitolized on a largely celebrated holiday like the fast food joints putting fish burgers on sale during lent.
There was no real knowledge or record of when Jesus was born. But it certainly wasn't being celebrated in late december. By changing the winter solstace into a christian holiday it allowed pagans to feel more comfortable celebrating a christian holiday on their already sacred time, while christians would see it as their day and not mind the formerly pagan holiday. And the Christmas tree didn't come in until years later.
What Constantine did was more of a stroke of political genius. There was a lot of strife in the empire, his subtle blending of paganism into christianity helped to stabilize things and unite a lot of people behind him.
