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You stated:  "The birth of Christ was set on December 25th by the early Church leaders in 440 a.d. on the Roman holiday of Saturnalia, the winter solstice."  However, the date of December 25 was actually set quite a bit earlier than that, sometime prior to A.D. 354 at the latest.  See http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/christmas.asp and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas#Feast_established.

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I stand corrected, however, I would put more weight on the article from Biblical Archeology Review than I would on Wikipedia. BAR states:

The December 25 feast seems to have existed before 312—before Constantine and his conversion, at least. As we have seen, the Donatist Christians in North Africa seem to have know it from before that time. Furthermore, in the mid- to late fourth century, church leaders in the eastern Empire concerned themselves not with introducing a celebration of Jesus’ birthday, but with the addition of the December date to their traditional celebration on January 6.

The Wikipedia may, indeed, be correct, but since the entries can be added and edited by anybody it doesn't have quite the credibility as BAR.

In any case, the focus of my post was on when Jesus was actually born, not when the birth is celebrated.
 

I’ve been a little behind on that, but I’ll try to be more consistent.