We will not dissemble and acknowledge that all the Christian holidays and associated rituals existed long before the appearance of Christianity itself. Rituals simply migrated from paganism, adopting a new religious name.
That is why, in order to understand how the rituals arose, one must look much further into the most primitive past of man.
Supernatural
The history of rituals must begin with a belief in the supernatural. Our ancestors tried at least somehow to explain the natural phenomena (thunder, lightning, rain, flood, drought, etc.). Since there was no scientific data on what was happening, I had to invent something myself.
So, in the most important moments for a person, he tried to solicit the favors of fate, so that some God would not be angry at random, and frosts were not struck before harvesting.
Thus, we can conclude that the emergence of rites is closely related to the economic necessity of man.
Epiphany
Let's start with the first religious rite that most of us face in the early days of our lives. In Christianity, it is believed that immersion of an infant in water protects him from Satan and flushes the original sin.
However, the idea that water will protect the child from evil spirit, was born long before Christianity, and the believers themselves did not immediately begin to engage in baptism. Today Catholics are poured with baptized water, Protestants - sprinkled with water, and Orthodox three times immerse the baby in it.
Participle
It is curious to disclose the mystery of how the rite of Christianity on the Communion arose. Formally, in Christianity, bread and wine symbolize the flesh and blood of Christ. Communion, a man is attached to the divine.
Previously, everything happened in a similar way. Communion arose with the birth of agriculture. Then, when the harvest and the increase of cattle were considered the most important things for the existence of man, wine and bread were considered the blood and flesh of the plant-gods and Spirits on whom the harvest depended.
Chrismation
In early Christianity, the sacrament of chrismation occurred only on Easter, and was carried out mainly over infants, and, of course, kings who became "representatives of God" in their kingdom only after the anointing.
However, not Christians came up with this custom . Mankind has always bowed before aromatic substances, people believed in their magical properties. In India, chrismation was performed at weddings, at baptism and funerals, and in Egypt at the consecration of the priests.