During the Commonwealth of England government under Cromwell, the Rump Parliament prohibited the practice of singing Christmas Carols as Pagan and sinful. Like other customs associated with popular Catholic Christianity, it earned the disapproval of Protestant Puritans. Famously, Cromwell's interregnum prohibited all celebrations of the Christmas holiday. This attempt to ban the the public celebration of Christmas can also be seen in the early history of Father Christmas.

The Westminster Assembly of Divines establish Sunday as the only holy day in the calendar in 1644. The new liturgy produced for the English church recognized this in 1645, and so legally abolished Christmas. Its celebration was declared an offence by Parliament in 1647. There is some debate as to the effectiveness of this ban, and whether or not it was enforced in the country.

Puritans generally disapproved of the celebration of Christmas--a trend which continually resurfaced in Europe and the USA through the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries.

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