Christmas in Ireland
The world is full of so many different cultures and people that the way Christmas around the world is celebrated will be special and unique to all those celebrating. Although many of the Christmas traditions around the world will be similar there are still a wonderful variety of customs for each Christmas around the world.
It is rather nice to know that Christmas around the world has very similar themes such as attending mass, the nativity scene and the decorating of trees.
In Ireland many of the favorite celebrations are popular Christmas traditions around the world. As Ireland is still a very religious country with Catholicism being very prevalent, it is said that the Christmas carol, The Twelve Days of Christmas goes back to when Catholicism was illegal and the gifts in the song were special references to Catholic dogma.
Lighting candles at Christmas holds religious significance and is said to symbolize hospitality for Mary and Joseph.
A traditional Irish Christmas dinner might include turkey, ham, stuffing and cranberry sauce with mince pies, Christmas pudding with brandy or rum sauce for dessert. Spiced beef is another traditional Irish dinner.
Singing and caroling is another traditional favorite practice at many a Christmas around the world. In Ireland the Wren Boys is a practice where participants dress up in homemade costumes yelling a song from house to house “the wren, the wren, the king of all birds”.
Usually people will treat the wren boys to porter and pudding and if any young people are present in the house they may end up going along until there is a group of children.
