Why isn't the feast of the Immaculate Conception 9 months before Jesus' birthday?

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Zechariah was acting as high priest when the birth of St. John the baptizer was announced to him in the Holy of Holies in the Temple. That would have been on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement which falls in late September. St. John was conceived shortly thereafter during Sukkot, the Festival of Booths.

At the Annunciation, the BVM was told that Elizabeth was 6 months pregnant. That would have been in late March. (BTW the feast of the Annunciation is celebrated on March 25th in the Roman Calendar. Oh, those rascally Catlicks!)

Nine months later Jesus was born sometime in late December.

Now there is an interesting coincidence with all this. St. John would have been born near the Summer Solstice (the longest day of the year) everyday after that would get shorter until the Winter Solstice six months later, which is the shortest day of the year. Every day after that would get longer. In the First Century the Winter Solstice fell on December 25th.

It would be fitting that Jesus would have been born on the shortest day of the year because he is the ā€œLight of the Worldā€:

Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. (John 8:12)

Everyday after his birth there was more light.

Also St. John the Baptizer said of himself:

He must increase, but I must decrease.ā€ (John 3:30)

Which is exactly what happened to the daylight after their respective births. (This was the point St. Augustine made in his championing the celebration of Jesusā€™ birth on the Winter Solstice).

So despite the objections of some pundits, December 25th is a very reasonable date to celebrate Jesusā€™ birth and not a concession to paganism.

The Winter Solstice was NOT a Roman Civil holiday until the late 3rd Century AD. The Emperor Aurelian made December 25th a civil holiday because the Christians were already using it to celebrate the Birth of Jesus and he was trying to detract from the Christian celebration!

None of the Sun Cults used December 25th before then. It appears that the Winter Solstice was originally a CHRISTIAN feast that the pagans tried to paganize, not the other way around.
 
JimG said:
Yes, I agree. When I was about ten years old in elementary school, I heard the same homily every year which set out exactly the meaning of the immaculate conception. The next year I would think, hey, Iā€™ve heard that before! The homilies I hear now are better at exegesis and homiletic presentation, but I still think it goes right over a lot of people.

Maybe the reason is that after the sexual revolution, when one speaks of immaculate conception, the immediate thought is that it must be about sex. So maybe now each homily must be preceded by an explanation that first, itā€™s not about sex, itā€™s about original sin, and sanctifying grace, and Mary being preserved from original sin and filled with sanctifying grace from the first moment of her existence, through the salvific grace given by her Son.
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šŸ™‚ The Church understands (I think) that the Immaculate Conception was in anticipation of the Resurrection. Iā€™d say the miracle was THE anticipation ofā€¦
 
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