Lighten up for festive season | Family Fun

Leonie Kennedy | 28th November 2008

MARK your diaries now and join the Coffs community from 6.00 to 8.00pm, Thursday, December 4, for the turning on of the Christmas tree lights on the roundabout at Harbour Drive and Gordon Street.

There will be plenty of entertainment including music from Coastal Soul, Coffs City Choir spreading Christmas cheer, South Sydney Rabbitohs meeting fans and signing autographs, a jumping castle, airbrush tattoos, balloons, face painting and free fairy floss for kids.

Plus, Santa and his real reindeers will be there to help celebrate!

The retailers in the City Centre will be open for late night shopping.

The community Christmas tree is a joint initiative between the Coffs Harbour Chamber of Commerce and the Coffs Harbour City Council.

The tradition of decorated Christmas trees goes back to the 7th century when a monk from Crediton, Devonshire, went to Germany to teach the word of God.

Legend has it he used the triangular shape of the fir tree to describe the Holy Trinity of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The converted people began to revere the fir tree as God's tree, as they had previously revered the oak in pagan times.

Some built Christmas pyramids of wood and decorated them with evergreens and candles.

It is a widely held belief that Martin Luther-King, in the early 16th century, while walking toward his home one winter evening, was awed by the brilliance of stars twinkling amid evergreens.

To recapture the scene for his family, he decorated a small Christmas tree with candles, to show his children how the stars twinkled through the dark night.

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