I'm a fourth generation atheist and we celebrate Christmas, tho the Scandinavians never called it Christmas. We still go by the old Yule (Jul). And we (Scandinavians) still practice the pre-christian traditions. We decorate our homes with typical Scandinavian yule-decorations, we give gifts and we eat traditional Scandinavian food. When i was a kid, we used to do other traditional stuff that was related to old superstition. Just for fun. The vikings had similar traditions, so why wouldn't we? It gets pretty dark up here in winter, so why not have something nice to look forward to when the winter enters it's darkest phase?
It's dark outside most of the day and so parents tell their kids about old superstition that people used to believe back in the days. Some of them were stories that mothers would tell their children in order to keep them from wandering off in to the woods after dark or going to close to the rivers or waterfalls. Like the stories about the trolls, nøkken, fossegrimen, draugen and huldra. And then we give the children flash-lights and let them play outside in the dark ^^.
It's dark outside most of the day and so parents tell their kids about old superstition that people used to believe back in the days. Some of them were stories that mothers would tell their children in order to keep them from wandering off in to the woods after dark or going to close to the rivers or waterfalls. Like the stories about the trolls, nøkken, fossegrimen, draugen and huldra. And then we give the children flash-lights and let them play outside in the dark ^^.
