Christmastime​—What Is Its Focus?

FOR millions the holiday season is a time to be with family and friends, a time to renew bonds of affection. Many others consider it a time to reflect on the birth of Jesus Christ and his role in the salvation of humankind. In Russia, unlike in many other lands, celebrating Christmas was not always something that people were free to do. Though for centuries those of the Russian Orthodox Church had openly celebrated Christmas, they were not allowed to do so for most of the 20th century. What was behind the change?

On the heels of the 1917 Bolshevik Communist revolution, Soviet authorities pursued an aggressive policy of statewide atheism. The entire Christmas holiday season with its religious overtones fell into disfavor. The State began waging a campaign against both Christmas and New Year’s celebrations. There was even open condemnation of the local symbols of the season​—the Christmas tree and Ded Moroz, or Grandfather Frost, the Russian equivalent of Santa Claus.

In 1935, a change occurred that profoundly altered the way Russians marked the holiday season. The Soviets reinstated Grandfather Frost, the seasonal tree, and the New Year’s celebration​—but with a significant twist. Grandfather Frost, it was said, would bring presents, not at Christmas, but on New Year’s Day. Similarly, no longer would there be a Christmas tree. It would be a New Year’s tree! Thus, there was a major change of focus in the Soviet Union. The New Year’s celebration, in effect, supplanted Christmas.

The Christmas season became a wholly secular festive occasion, officially bereft of any religious meaning. The New Year’s tree was decorated, not with religious ornaments, but with secular ones depicting the progress of the Soviet Union. The Russian journal Vokrug Sveta (Around the World) explains: “It is possible to retrace the history of the establishing of a Communist society by the New Year’s tree decorations of various years of the Soviet era. Along with commonplace bunnies, icicles, and round loaves of bread, decorations in the shape of sickles, hammers, and tractors were released. These were later replaced by figurines of miners and cosmonauts, oil rigs, rockets, and moon buggies.”

What about Christmas Day itself? It certainly was not recognized. Rather, the Soviet authority relegated it to the status of an ordinary workday. Those who wished to hold the religious celebration of Christmas could do so only very discreetly, risking the State’s disfavor and unpleasant consequences. Yes, in 20th-century Russia, there was a shift in the focus of the holiday season, from religious observance to secular celebration.

A More Recent Shift

In 1991 the Soviet Union fell and greater freedoms were realized. Gone was the State policy of atheism. Various newly formed sovereign states were largely secular, with a separation of Church and State. Many religiously inclined people felt that they could now pursue their religious convictions. They reasoned that one way to do this would be to celebrate the religious holiday of Christmas. However, deep disappointment soon set in for many such ones. Why?

With each passing year, the holiday has become more commercialized. Yes, as in the West, the Christmas season has become one of the best ways for manufacturers, wholesalers, and merchants to make money. Christmas decorations are prominently displayed on storefronts. Western-style Christmas music and carols, hitherto unknown in Russia, emanate from shops. Salesmen carrying large bags of Christmas knickknacks ply their wares on commuter trains and other public transportation. That is what you find now.

Even those who see nothing wrong with this rank commercialism may be bothered by another disturbing element of the season​—alcohol abuse with all its negative consequences. An emergency-room physician in a Moscow hospital explained: “For doctors, it’s a given that the New Year’s celebration will mean a slew of injuries ranging from bumps and bruises to knife and bullet wounds, most having been caused by domestic violence, drunken brawls, and car accidents.” A senior staff scientist of a branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences said: “There is a surge in the number of alcohol-related deaths. It was particularly high in the year 2000. The number of suicides and murders jumped as well.”

Unfortunately, any such behavior during the holiday season in Russia is aggravated by another factor. Under the headline “Russians Celebrate Christmas Twice,” the newspaper Izvestiya reports: “Almost 1 in 10 Russians celebrates Christmas twice. As witnessed by the survey of the ROMIR monitoring center, 8 percent of respondents admitted that they celebrate Christmas both on December 25, according to the Catholic Christmas calendar, and on January 7, according to Orthodoxy . . . For some, it is evidently not the religious essence of Christmas that is important as much as it is the opportunity to celebrate.”a