Christmas is celebrated on December 25 every year. The Christians celebrate Christmas or the birth anniversary of Jesus Christ with great cheer and enthusiasm all over India. People in their best clothes attend the special service at midnight. It is a week long festival of feasting, rejoicing, greeting and giving & receiving gifts. In India it is a general holidays.
The celebration starts with carole singing, visiting friends and relations till late in the night. On the final day, a midnight mass followed by the pealing of the church bells, ushers in the New Year. In India, some big cities and towns processions are taken out with tableau saints. At some places special stalls are set up and fairs are held. Christmas beautifully decorate their houses, shops, establishments, hospitals, schools and churches and illuminate them. They erect Christmas trees and exchange greetings around it. The Roman Catholics do not follow the ritual of decorating the Christmas tree.
Christmas is also an occasion of family reunion. The members of the family, staying and working at distant places join together in merry-making at one place and enjoy themselves. The Christmas have made much contribution to the religious and cultural variety and richness of India. Perhaps the first Christians to land here were those who fled persecution from Presia and Mesopotamia in the middle of the fourth century and landed at Malbar coast. Like the Jews, they also found a ready asylum here. Thus, the roots of Christianity in India are older than that of Islam. Hindus also take part in Christian celebrations with their Christian friends and fellow workers with great cheer and enthusiasm.
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