What is the country in Latin America that does not celebrate Christmas?

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Uruguay: The Latin American Country that Doesn’t Celebrate Christmas

Christmas is a date long awaited by many people around the world. It is a date in which families meet, give each other gifts and enjoy together the hundreds of plants and lighting that are placed in the streets and houses to celebrate these dates. Although there are many very different cultures, December is a representative month for most of them, so in almost the entire world the 24th and 25th are days with meanings beyond simply experiencing a holiday. However, there is a country in South America that does not experience it this way. This is Uruguay, the only Latin American country that does not celebrate or dress its cities for the Christmas holiday. But what is the reason? We tell it to you.

Why doesn’t Uruguay celebrate Christmas?

The main reason is related to the separation between state and church more than 100 years ago. Since 1919, Uruguayan laws marked a formal distance that led to the calendar of birth holidays being eliminated and replaced by: ‘Family Day’. According to Roger Geymonat, a historian who has researched religiosity in Uruguay, the distance between the Church and the State began to be marked since 1860, when the decision was made to create the decree called ‘Secularization of cemeteries’. With this rule, it was decided that the bodies would not be transported to the Churches for hygiene reasons, but rather would be taken directly to the cemetery.

With this rule, it was decided that the bodies would not be transported to the Churches for hygiene reasons, but rather would be taken directly to the cemetery. Although it seems like a barely logical measure, at that time it was a hard blow for the Church, which led to harsh confrontations.

Since then, measures began to be imposed that increasingly distanced the Church from the common places. Among these measures were: The founding of new convents was prohibited until legislation on the issue was passed. Priests who criticized the authorities or the laws were ordered to be confined in prison, without further formalities. Limitations were established on the exercise of cemetery worship, prohibiting any episcopal or any other Church blessing of sites intended for cemeteries. Mandatory civil marriage was established prior to religious marriage. In 1905, the divorce bill was presented. A hospital was created. Children, called ‘Pereira-Rosell’, under a strictly secular regime

According to Gaymonat, the measures taken were not intended to make the country secular; however, since 1885 a ‘clerical storm’ was unleashed that made the official separation inevitable.

What celebrations stopped being celebrated in Uruguay?

Uruguayans do not recognize several holidays by their usual name, although they do have these days as holidays. This is how some of the most recognized dates changed:

Find out here what the history of the celebration of December 25 in the rest of the world is.