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For the majority of those who observe it, Christmas is over and done with by the time January rolls around. But for some Christians, it's just getting started. A sizable minority of Christians who follow the Orthodox church celebrate Christmas in early January. The split on what date Christmas is observed goes back to the 16th century, as National Geographic reports, with the advent of the Gregorian calendar. The Gregorian calendar, adopted by Pope Gregory XIII, solved date-and-time-keeping problems that had built up over the years due to the previous system being out of sync with the Earth's rotation around the sun. But not all of Christendom adopted it. Because Orthodox Christians don't recognize the pope as the leader of the church, they have continued to use an older calendar system for religious purposes. Here's how National Geographic described the origins of the Christmas date discrepancy: The Julian calendar is a Roman system introduced by Julius Caesar in 46 B.C., which the Gregorian calendar replaced. The observance of Christmas for Orthodox Christians also is a bit different from what those in the Western world might be familiar with, as National Geographic noted:
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