Yule is a pagan celebration which dates back before Christmas was celebrated. With many of our celebrations there is a link between Pagan and Christian. The Pagans celebrated during the middle of December up to January.

Yule is the celebration for winter and was usually started on the longest night of the year which fell in December. The whole community would gather around the yule log. As you know we celebrate Christmas with chocolate yule log cakes and fires . The Scottish burn a log to keep out the mischievous elves.

The celebration of yule, like Christmas, focuses upon the birth of a son to the goddess Mabon. He was later known as God of the stars. Christians also link a star with the birth of baby Jesus at Christmas, the son of God.

Original celebrations of Yule would have involved decorating homes, especially with lights as he was thought to have brought about light, and sharing presents and a winter feast. When Christmas started to be celebrated, they tried to change the Pagans into the Christian believes but it was proving to be a very hard job. The Christians celebrated the birth of Christ in December to bring it closer to the time that the Pagans celebrated Yule, they both then agreed to celebrate on the same day and therefore shared the traditions of giving gifts and hanging decorations and enjoying a nice winter feast. The hanging of green wreaths were thought of by the Pagans as bringing in protection and for the Christians they are a decoration. Even the lights on our Christmas trees, were once a sign of light by candles on the Yule log and were then changed to candles on the tree and nowadays the many different lights that we see.

Seeing as the celebration of Yule came first, you could say that Christmas took most of its ideas from Yule. Everything from the star to the gifts and decorating the home, was already a part of Pagan celebration. They even hung decorations for the twelve nights as Christians also refer to at Christmas.  Christmas and Yule bothe celebrate the birth of a special son and show respect to their God for that son.

It really gets you wondering how much of the Christian celebration was just to steer people away from Pagans. Why did they feel such a need to change dates and take on the same traditions? If this celebration was for real, people would have believed in it without having to change the times. Christians were obviously scared of people enquiring about the Pagan tradition of Yule therefore shadowing it with Christmas.