Volunteers clad in Santa Claus costumes throw their hats in the air as they gather to deliver gifts to the poor in downtown Seoul (Seoul National Capital Area) ROK.
******
Christmas at St Adalbert of Prague Roman Catholic parish in Kaliningrad (Kaliningrad Oblast. Northwestern Federal District) RF.
******
British travellers Liam Wadeson (left), Jemma Wild and Ashley Colotta, (right), frolic in the waves as they celebrate Christmas Day at Bondi Beach in Sydney (Sydney Region. New South Wales) AUSTRALIA.
******
The choir at Shrine of Mary Help of Christian Church sings during Christmas Mass in Nairobi (Nairobi County. Nairobi Metro Area) KENYA.
******
A Chinese man prays during Christmas Eve mass of at the South Cathedral official Catholic church in Beijing (Beijing Municipality) PRC.
******
Members of a local parachute club wearing Santa Claus costumes fly past residential buildings dropping presents to pedestrians during a promotional event celebrating Christmas in Guiyang (Guizhou Province) PRC.
******
A Pakistani Christian family gathers around a fire to warm themselves from the evening cold in an alley of a Christian neighbourhood decorated with festive lights for Christmas in Islamabad (Islamabad Capital Area) PAKISTAN.
******
Men look at a Christmas tree, with pictures of the 43 missing trainee teachers, in the Ayotzinapa Teacher Training Raul Isidro Burgos College in Ayotzinapa, on the outskirts of Chilpancingo de los Bravo (Guerrero) MEXICO.
******
On Christmas Eve, a Palestinian dressed as Santa Claus holds balloons at Manger Square, outside the Church of the Nativity, traditionally believed by Christians to be the birthplace of Jesus Christ, in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Bethlehem Governorate) PALESTINE.
******
A man exits an illuminated Church on Christmas Eve in Ahmedabad (Ahmedabad District. Gujarat State) INDIA.
******
Archbishop Paolo Pezzi (centre) during Midnight Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Moscow (Federal City of Moscow. Central Federal District) RF.
******
Indian girls pose for photos near decorative statues of Santa Claus outside a church on Christmas in Mumbai (Mumbai City District. Maharashtra State) INDIA.
******
A US Army soldier from the 3 Cavalry Regiment dressed as Santa Claus greets fellow soldiers eating Christmas lunch at Forward Operating Base Gamberi in Laghman Province of Afghanistan.
******
Pope Francisco Bergoglio kissed the statue of baby Jesus as he arrived to lead Christmas Midnight Mass at St Peter Basilica in Vatican City. He prayed for peace in the Ukraine and decried the “brutal persecution” of Christians and other religious minorities in Iraq and Syria in his traditional Christmas address, known as the Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world).
_______________________________
Christmas is one of the main Christian holidays. It’s an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus, observed as a religious and cultural tradition among billions of people across the world. Christmas Day is a public holiday in many of the world’s nations, and a great number of non-Christian people celebrate it. According to the Gregorian calendar, the Roman Catholic Church and most Protestant churches celebrate Christmas on 25 December. Roman Emperor Theodosius II made the decision to celebrate Christmas on 25 December at the Third Ecumenical Council of Ephesus in 431.
Advent precedes Christmas, which starts four weeks before Christmas. This period is supposed to prepare the faithful the birth of Jesus. The festive customs associated in various countries with Christmas mix pre-Christian, Christian, and secular themes and origins. Popular customs of the holiday include gift giving, completing an Advent calendar, Christmas music and carolling, a special meal, and the display of various Christmas decorations, such as Christmas trees, Christmas lights, and garlands.
Christmas is associated with Santa Claus, also known as also known as St Nicholas and Father Christmas, a cultural figure with legendary, folkloric, and historic origins. In many Western cultures, folklore has it that Santa Claus brings presents to the homes of good children the night before Christmas. According to early Roman Christian traditions, three special liturgies are served on Christmas… a midnight Mass, a Mass at dawn, and a Mass during the day. In the Roman Catholic Church, Christmas celebrations last for eight days, from 25 December to 1 January, a period known as the Octave.
The North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) tracks Santa Claus when he leaves his official residence in the North Pole and flies around the world in his sleigh. NORAD has tracked Santa’s journey for more than 50 years. As gift-giving and many other Christmas customs involve heightened economic activity, the holiday became a key sales period for retailers and businesses all around the world. Groups and schools often perform Nativity plays and Christmas pageants during the holiday period. They depict the story of the birth of Jesus Christ. The tradition dates from the 10th-century Roman Empire.
25 December 2014
Sputnik International
http://sputniknews.com/photo/20141225/1016225951.html
Voices from Russia 
Cardinal Koch Sez the End of Communism Wasn’t All Good for Christianity
Tags: Cardinal Kurt Koch, Catholic Church, Christian, Christianity, Cold War, Eastern Catholic Churches, Eastern Orthodox Church, ecumenical, Ecumenical Patriarch, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Ecumenical Patriarchate, Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, ecumenism, EP, Galician Uniate, Greek, Greek Orthodox Church, Greeks, Hilarion Alfeyev, history, Kurt Koch, Moscow Patriarchate, MP, Orthodox, Orthodoxy, political commentary, politics, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Russia, Russian, Russian history, Russian Orthodox Church, Soviet Union, UGKTs, Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Uniate, Uniates, USSR, Vatican, Vatican Radio
______________________________
On Monday, Cardinal Kurt Koch, the top Roman Catholic official for inter-church relations, said that the end of communist rule in Europe, which began 25 years ago this month, wasn’t all positive for Christianity because it brought tensions between Rome and Russia back to the surface. He said that the re-emergence of Uniates in the Ukraine and Romania after decades of suppression created major tensions with the Russian Orthodox Church. Russian Orthodox leaders accused the Vatican-aligned Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGKTs) of trying to take back churches and woo away believers from the MP. The UGKTs and the Vatican deny this. MP bishops cited this as a hurdle to closer ties between Orthodox and Catholics, which for decades prayed for the conversion of the USSR, only to see the newly resurgent Russian Orthodox Church become a difficult partner. Koch told Vatican Radio, “The changes in 1989 weren’t advantageous for ecumenical relations. Eastern Catholic churches banned by Stalin re-emerged, especially in the Ukraine and Romania, and the Orthodox brought out old accusations about Uniate churches and proselytism”. “Uniate” refers to Eastern (sic) churches with Orthodox-style liturgies that recognise the pope as their spiritual leader.
Later this month, Pope Francisco Bergoglio will meet Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew Archontonis in Istanbul. Bartholomew supports more cooperation with Rome, but can’t ignore the wary Russians, who make up two-thirds of the world’s 300 million Orthodox. Koch, who spoke a week after the 25th anniversary of the Berlin Wall’s fall, and on the same day as Czechs marked the start of their democratic revolution, noted that talks on closer ties between Catholic and Orthodox theologians were suspended between 2000 and 2006 because of tensions between the two sides, saying, “There are always setbacks, but I’m convinced that we can make more progress”. He noted that persecution of Christians in the Middle East brought Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants there together, but the Ukrainian crisis heightened tensions among churches, saying, “We’ve repeatedly heard major complaints from the Russian Orthodox. This is unfortunate because churches are supposed to be a factor for unity and reconciliation”. Last month, Metropolitan Ilarion Alfeyev, the Number Two man {not so… it’s a common ignorant Western misconception: editor} in the Moscow Patriarchate, used his guest presentation to a Vatican synod on the family to accuse the UGKTs of trying to poach Orthodox believers.
17 November 2014
Tom Heneghan
Kevin Liffey
Reuters
http://news.yahoo.com/end-communism-not-good-christianity-vatican-190929295.html