No, Christmas was not invented by the Catholic church. Technically the Catholic church probably cannot be said to exist until a later date in history. We must wait for the split that defined the Greek Orthodox and western (Catholic) traditions. December 25th was the feast date of the birth of Sol Invictus (the Unconquered Sun). There is even a mosaic portraying Christ as Sol, or Apollo, pulling his sun chariot across the sky, that is beneath the Vatican. This is a case of syncretic religion where growing numbers of people probably came to identify Sol Invictus as Christ and so it may have been totally natural, in that situation, for many Christians to come to identify the 25th as Christ's birthday. Gift giving was simply part the of Roman tradition for this festival, so it begins to look as though as more and more celebrants became Christian they simply continued in the same tradition but adopted a new name for the old celebration. They came to call it Christmas instead of Sol Invictus.
The first letters and books of the New Testament were written at a time that members of Jesus' family were still living. Had any of those writers been interested in a true biographical and historical account of Jesus' life that information was still available at that time. The fact is none of the writers whom we've incorporated into the New Testament seem to have been at all interested in that kind of information. They are more interested in promoting the supernatural aspects surrounding, not Jesus the man, but Christ the god. It seems a true biographical account wasn't part of their agenda.