Christmas is not just a day, according to the Christian tradition, it's a season -- and it's not over yet.

Contrary to the commercial notion that the Christmas season begins on Black Friday, Christians consider the weeks leading up to Christmas to be the advent season and Dec. 25 to be the start of the Christmas season, known as the 12 Holy Days of Christmas among Eastern Christians.

The season ends with the Feast of the Epiphany on Wednesday. In Eastern orthodoxy, it's typically called the Feast of the Theophany and is celebrated either Jan. 6 or Jan. 19, depending on the calendar used in a particular Eastern church.

Celebrated by Christians since the early centuries of the church, the feast "starts the season of the Epiphany, which is the showing forth of Jesus," says the Rev. W. Lee Shaw, pastor of St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in West Valley City. "Epiphany is one of those seasons that many people just don't know about. It's a quiet season."

The central image of Epiphany for Western Christians is the three Magi reaching the infant Christ in Bethlehem.

For Orthodox Christians, the central image is Christ's baptism in the Jordan River, with the Father speaking from heaven and the Holy Spirit descending as a dove.

"It's a special time when the revelation of the Trinity is made manifest to us," says the Rev. Elias Koucos at Prophet Elias Church, part of the Salt Lake Valley's Greek Orthodox community.

While many evangelical and nondenominational Protestant churches do not celebrate the feast, those that follow a liturgical calendar -- Orthodox Christians, Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, Lutherans and other mainline Protestant denominations -- do.

In fact, it's one of the biggest feasts of the year in the Greek Orthodox Church, Koucos says.

Tuesday will be a strict fast day for parishioners, and the divine liturgy that night and Wednesday will be followed by the blessing of water. Parishioners will drink from that water and take bottles to sprinkle it in their homes, he says. Priests also will make visits to bless homes during the month.

"Hopefully they don't look at it as just a traditional commemoration of a historical event. It's ... Christ being with us all the time. It brings his presence to us."

Western Christian churches will have special services or Masses Wednesday to mark the feast and will begin a cycle of scriptural readings that focus on Christ manifesting himself to the world.

The first readings and sermons probably will be about the Magi, the first Gentiles touched by Christ. In the coming weeks, Christ's baptism and first miracle, turning the water into wine at Cana, will be a focus.

"We spend this time after Christmas talking about how Jesus is being made known to the world," Shaw says. "It's less about his teachings."

The Epiphany season is one of the four times during the year when baptisms are typically performed in Episcopal churches, Shaw says. At St. Stephen's, baptisms will occur Jan. 10.

Many Christians make it a point to keep their Christmas trees and lights up until the Epiphany to remember that the season does not end on Christmas Day, Shaw and Koucos say.

For the Orthodox, the Epiphany season ends 13 days after it begins. For Western Christians, it ends on Shrove Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent, which is Feb. 17 this year.

kmoulton@sltrib.com