In France Père Noel is responsible for filling the shoes of French children with gifts.
While in Spain the children place their shoes under the tree on the night of January 5th and the next morning they find they have been filled with gifts by the three kings.
The luckiest children of Spain receive small presents from papa noel on Christmas Eve as well.
Christ kind or Christ Child is an angel-like figure who often accompanied St. Nicholas on his holiday missions and Kris Kringle is believed to deliver presents to well-behaved Swiss and German children.
In Finland Santa is a kind and jolly elf called Joulupukki and he doesn’t drive a sleigh but He rides a straw goat called Ukko.
The Scandinavians call the jolly elf Jultomten who is thought to deliver gifts in a sleigh drawn by goats.
In Holland, sinter Klaas has a faithful servant called black peter who rides on the sleigh and its Peter’s job to throw the children’s presents down the chimney.
In addition it is black peter that doles out the punishment to the naughty children by wrapping the offenders in bags and delivering them to Spain.
The three wise men stopped at La Befana’s house on route to Bethlehem.
After dining with her, she was invited to travel with them on their search for the Christ child but she declined on some flimsy presence.
After a while she regretted her action and gathering up some things from her home to give to the Christ child she set off after them.
But alas, she was unable to find either the wise men or the baby Jesus.
La Befana has been searching ever since and every January 5th the kindly witch rides her broomstick down the chimneys of Italian homes to fill the stockings of lucky children with sweets and candy.
The hanging of greens, such as holly, ivy and Mistletoe is a British winter tradition with origins far before the Christian era.
Greenery
was used to lift people’s spirits during the long winter and remind them that
spring was not far away.
Ivy,
the accepted symbol of friendship, like Holly and Mistletoe, has since pagan
times been used as a decoration at festivals.
The
ancient custom was to decorate the doorway with intertwined garlands of Holly
and Ivy which represented unity between the dual halves of divinity the Holly
was the Goddess and female while Ivy was the eternal representation of consort
to the goddess and therefore was masculine in nature.
In
pagan religions Ivy had been a symbol of eternal life while the Christians
believe it stands for the new promise of eternal life.
The
Romans used Ivy as part of celebrations related to the god Bacchus, whose
worshippers were thought to have worn Ivy crowns.
We
rarely decorate our houses with ivy anymore at Christmas, but many homes have
potted ivy plants in the home all year round.
The hanging of greens, such as Holly, Ivy and Mistletoe is a British winter tradition with origins far before the Christian era.
Greenery was used to lift people’s spirits
during the long winter and remind them that spring was not far away.
The holly wreath with its red berries and
other decorations dates back to the 17th century.
The roundness of the Wreath and the
sharpness of its pointed Holly leaves symbolized Christ's crown-of-thorns and its
Red berries the drops of Christ's blood.
The wreath was intertwined with red ribbons
to express the festive spirit and the evergreen leaves stood for everlasting
life and promised faithfulness to the Lord.
The Wreath which is traditionally displayed
on the front door of a home during the weeks of Advent and the Christmas season
once was a multiple role.
Harking back to its pagan origins the
wreath was believed to protect a home from evil spirits and during the Middle
Ages the red Holly berries were thought to keep witches at bay.
A wreath on the door at Christmas signified
a home that celebrated the birth of Christ.
