The Day from Hell...

Okay, I hate Valentine's Day. It's one of those things/days that I wish I could just dis-invent. All day you get these annoyingly perky, single, Christian women wishing everyone a "Happy Singles Appreciation Day" or "Happy Singles Awareness Day"...Well guess what, I KNOW I'M SINGLE! Thanks for the reminder!

What's so special about Feb. 14th that we have to single out the single people or the couples? It's just another day of the year.

...

Okay, I stand corrected, there is an actual history behind the day and guess what: it has NOTHING to do with the "awareness" or "appreciation" of one being single.

History:

Valentine's Day started in the time of the Roman Empire. In ancient Rome February 14th was a holiday to honour Juno. Juno was the Queen of the Roman Gods and Goddesses. The Romans also knew her as the Goddess of women and marriage. The following day, February 15th, began the Feast of Lupercalia.

The lives of young boys and girls were strictly separate. However, one of the customs of the young people was name drawing. On the eve of the festival of the names of Roman girls were written on slips of paper and placed into jars. Each young man would draw a girl's name from the jar and would then be partners for the duration of the festival with the girl whom he chose. Sometimes the pairing of the children lasted an entire year, and often, they would fall in love and would later marry.

Under the rule of Emperor Claudius II Rome was involved in many bloody and unpopular campaigns. Claudius the Cruel was having a difficult time getting soldiers to join his military leagues. He believed that the reason was that roman men did not want to leave their loves or families. As a result, Claudius cancelled all marriages and engagements in Rome. The good Saint Valentine was a priest at Rome in the days of Claudius II. He and Saint Marius aided the Christian martyrs and secretly married couples, and for this kind deed Saint Valentine was apprehended and dragged before the Prefect of Rome, who condemned him to be beaten to death with clubs and to have his head cut off. He suffered martyrdom on the 14th day of February, about the year 270. At that time it was the custom in Rome, a very ancient custom, indeed, to celebrate in the month of February the, feasts in honour of a heathen god. On these occasions, amidst a variety of pagan ceremonies, the names of young women were placed in a box, from which they were drawn by the men as chance directed.

The pastors of the early Christian Church in Rome endeavoured to do away with the pagan element in these feasts by substituting the names of saints for those of maidens. And as the began about the middle of February, the pastors appear to have chosen Saint Valentine's Day for the celebration of this new. So it seems that the custom of young men choosing maidens for valentines, or saints as patrons for the coming year, arose in this way.

So, we can see that valentine's Day has been quite slaughtered by our very consumer driven mind set and drive to be politically correct...Heaven forbid we honor some people and not others!

Okay, now I know some of you who read my blog are thinking, "What's your problem? Why so bitter?" or something similar...And to be perfectly honest, I've just been burned to many times on Valentine's Day to really care, but I'm so stubborn that it annoys me when people are bright and bubbly about the day, and even more so if they're pushing the whole "day of singleness."

Valentine's Day is a day for couples, not single people. It's a day to celebrate the right to love and to marry the one you love, not to celebrate one's singleness or to take focus off of the purpose behind the holiday (Sound familiar? The meaning and purpose of Christmas has been slaughtered by our consumer life style too.).

Okay, well that's enough out of me. I have work to do now, enjoy the rest of whatever you call this day.