Natal Day, the Latin *natalis* ("of the birth"), is the root of both Noël and Nativity, and it points back to a pagan festival rather than to anything biblical. Rome celebrated the winter solstice as *Dies Natalis Solis Invicti*, the Day of the Birth of the Unconquered Sun, when the sun's light, having reached its lowest point, begins to regain strength. In pre-Christian times the solstice fell on December 25, so the Romans treated that date as the sun's birthday or rebirth-day. The Roman Catholic Church appears to have absorbed this festival into Christianity, aided by an allegorical calculation holding that Jesus was conceived on the date He died (March 25) and therefore born nine months later on December 25. Modern scholars downplay any link between Christmas and the pagan celebration, but Augustine's Christmas-day sermon suggests otherwise. He urged his hearers to keep the day as a feast not for the sake of the sun, which believers and unbelievers alike behold, but for the sake of Him who created the sun. He evidently felt compelled to remind his congregation that the Christian observance had superseded the pagan one. Neither the name nor the date originates in the Bible, and Scripture commands no celebration of Christ's birth at the winter season. The names of the holiday reveal what it is really about.

Scripture records no birthday feast for Christ or any faithful person; only sinners like Pharaoh and Herod made great rejoicings over the day they were born. The 1911 Catholic Encyclopedia article "Natal Day" records Origen saying exactly this. Christians did not observe Christ's birth until about AD 300, and the December 25 date comes from the Roman pagan festivals Saturnalia and Brumalia and the sun-god's birthday, dies natalis Solis Invicti. Constantine's blending of sun worship with Christianity made it easy to rename the pagan winter solstice festival the birthday of the Son of God, and in the fifth century the Roman Church ordered Christ's birth observed on that day, calling it Christmas. Christ was actually born in the autumn, so the date is false. The birthday gifts claim is also false, since the Magi brought gifts to a young child as a king, not to honor His birth, and gift exchange itself derives from pagan worship. A mixture of truth and falsehood makes the whole a lie. God forbids worshipping Him the way pagans worship their gods (Deuteronomy 12:29-32), and He never commanded a birthday celebration of Christ. Instead, He commands the seven holy days of Leviticus 23, which alone Christ and the apostles kept.

Celebrating birthdays is a pagan custom, not a Christian one. The Catholic Encyclopedia, under "Natal Day," records Origen's acknowledgment that no one in the Scriptures is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday; only sinners like Pharaoh and Herod made great rejoicings over the day they were born. The early Christians likewise honored the deaths of remarkable persons rather than their births, and the Communion is the New Testament memorial of Christ's death. Christ's birthday was never observed by the apostles or the early Church, and the Bible contains no command to celebrate it. Its exact date is hidden, and had God wished it observed, He would not have concealed it. Jesus was not born on December 25th, since shepherds were still in the fields by night, which points to early autumn rather than winter. December 25th was the birthday of the sun-god and of Nimrod in the Babylonian system, and the Roman Church later attached Christ's name to that festival. Selecting some date to celebrate as His birthday is therefore wrong. Pagan customs cannot be used to honor God, for He forbids worship patterned on pagan practice (Deuteronomy 12:30-31), requires worship in spirit and truth (John 4:24), and rejects commandments of men taught as doctrine (Matthew 15:9). The wise men's gifts were not birthday gifts but the customary tribute presented to a king, given to Christ Himself and not exchanged among themselves.