Typically I try not to preach, there are far too many of my friends, acquaintances, etc… and since I claim to be Switzerland more often than not, I keep out of most discussions dealing with politics and religion. But like all things there is typically an exception and this is one of those exceptions.

My family decided to go to a rather late evening mass for Christmas and I went with them, during the priest’s homily he talked about how was a bit of a history buff and proceeded to talk about the Christmas “truce” of 1914 that occurred in the trenches of World War I. You know the one where throughout most of Europe in the trenches of the war, the British and German troops (around Christmas Day) fraternized with one another to the point that there were a few groups that were playing football in “No Man’s Land”.

Being the curious skeptic that I was the moment that I went home I did some research online wondering if this could be true and wouldn’t you know it… it was… There are many articles and websites online like History.com that have given short summaries of what had happened in the trenches.

Some pages claim that this form of chivalry and fraternization is one of the last moments in history to have occurred on such a grand scale. Other sites have claimed that this occurred for week leading up to Christmas Day and quite possibly for a week there after leading into the New Year.

There have been reported cases of the swapping of gifts, singing Christmas caroles, and just some good natured camaraderie. So what happened?
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