Jesus and Christmas part 2 -
Who is Santa Claus?
Christians have three options when it comes to culture, including culture’s approach to Christmas. We can reject it and try to have no part with it, segregating ourselves. We can receive it and accept it as good. We can redeem it, seeking to transform what we can for good without necessarily endorsing the whole.
Since Santa and Father Christmas and commercial Christmas are pervasive in our culture it is nearly impossible to reject them outright, especially in terms of our children’s experience at school and nursery and among friends. They are here to stay. That does not mean as parents we can only receive the entirety blindly. The third option is to redeem.
The historical roots of Santa Claus are one example of an approach to redeeming Christmas.
The Truth about Santa Claus
Santa Claus was a real person, though many of the aspects of today's character have been added such as the flying reindeer, living in the North Pole, and delivering presents to every child in one night. Today’s Santa is a combination of a true man and some mythical extras.
A Gift-Giver
These fantasies and myths surrounding Santa Claus actually derive from the very real person of Saint Nicholas. Nicholas was born in the third century in Patara, Turkey to an affluent family. When young his parents died tragically but had raised him as a Christian, which led him to spend his significant inheritance helping the poor. He frequently gave gifts to children, sometimes even hanging socks filled with treats and presents.
A Courageous Leader
As an adult he was a well-loved Christian leader, eventually voted the Bishop of Myra, a port city Paul visited (Acts 27:5-6). Nicholas reportedly also travelled to the legendary Council of Nicaea to defend the deity of Jesus Christ in A.D. 325. He died on December 6, 343 and was canonized as a saint. The anniversary of his death became the St. Nicholas holiday when gifts were given in his memory. He remained a very popular saint among Catholic and Orthodox Christians. Some two thousand churches were or are named after him. The holiday in his honour eventually merged with Christmas and moved to December 25th.
A Freedom Bringing Saviour
Nicholas also risked his own life and freedom intervening to rescue young girls and women from being forced into the sex trade. One story records how he saved three sisters by secretly placing gold coins in their stockings, hung out to dry, until they had accumulated enough money to buy their freedom. Their 'owners', knowing their example might encourage other girls to do the same, them sort to imprison then. Nicholas led a group of men in a midnight raid, freeing the girls and paying for them to begin a new life elsewhere.
A Forgotten Hero
During the Reformation Nicholas fell out of favour with Protestants who did not accept canonising certain people. In Holland his legend as Sinterklass lived on though most countries gradually forgot him. In Germany, Martin Luther replaced him with the ‘Christ-child’ as the object of holiday celebration called ‘Christkindl’. This became pronounced Kris Kringle and became another name for Santa Claus.
Mythical Extras
Legends became attached to this historical figure.
There was a myth in Nicholas' day that a demon was entering people's homes to terrorize children and that Nicholas could cast him out. There was a Siberian myth (isn't that near the North Pole?) that a magical-shaman entered people's homes through their chimneys to leave them mushrooms as gifts. He would hang them in front of the fire to dry where reindeer would eat them and become intoxicated. The shaman and his deer were believed in be able to fly. Hence our modern image of Santa Claus traveling from the North Pole to slide down chimneys and leave presents on fireplaces before flying away with reindeer.
Redeeming Santa Claus
The real Saint Nick was a wonderful man who loved Jesus and served him faithfully, generously and bravely. We do not need to reject Santa Claus nor receive him as culture as defined him. We can and should redeem him, especially for our children as he points to Jesus and true devotion to Jesus. Its a true story of a great Christian full of adventure and fun and victory - what child won't enjoy that Christmas reality told them?
How Santa Claus became Father Christmas is a whole other story more to do with popular fizzy drinks and an emerging market of teenagers in the mid-20th century!
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Thanks for that - I knew a little of the history of Saint Nicholas and Santa, (here's a question - why is Satan sometimes referred to as Saint Nick?) but nowhere near that much!
ReplyDeleteWhen my eldest son was old enough to start appreciating Christmas, I held back on talking about Father Christmas (I know this isn't exactly true, but to me, Father Christmas feels more British, and Santa Claus more American), but it didn't matter; as you say, our culture is permeated with it, and he soon found out all about it, anyway.
I've since told him that Father Christmas is a story, but not real. I think he half-believes me. I don't want to be a killjoy, and I want my kids to love the magic of Christmas, but I've met too many adults who don't believe in God because their parents taught them about both God and Santa. And if one isn't real, then neither is the other. I don't want to fall into that mistake. It seems bizarre that this is even an issue - but we have to make Christmas magical without the flying reindeer and all that. Or maybe rather... making Christmas less magical and more miraculous! And I love Christmas tradition, and I wouldn't want to get rid of it, but we have to be aware of when traditions aren't helpful.
There's that old adage that Cromwell banned Christmas festivities to keep Christmas Jesus-centred. I've read conflicting reports as to whether that's true or not, but it's an interesting thought. But as a Christmas glutton, I think I want everything I can manage - as much Jesus, family, food, presents, games, decorations, snow(!) as I can get.
Thanks for another thought provoking article.
Ben
Thanks Ben. Great comment. We talk about father c as 'pretend real', our phrase for all those characters that fit in the twilight zone between real and fantasy in the minds of under 5. This year we re introducing Santa Claus as st nick (or maybe sir nick?) one of God's greatest heroes. And Santa Claus/ father c reminds us of him.
ReplyDeleteRe st nick and satan. Maybe the mythical evil spirit bit the story above got even more twisted? Or perhaps simply the similarity between the words Santa and satan?
Over the last 5 years I have told my children that santa is not real but a nice christmas story. I do sometimes wonder if it is the right thing but they still love christmas all the same.
ReplyDeleteI've gone on the basis that we shouldn't lie to our kids. I suppose that I tend to find other more mature christians and look at how they deal with these things which is not on its own always helpful as can make things seem very black and white.
Both my children aged 5 and 8 still choose to go and see santa every year and sprinkle reindeer food on the grass even though they know its not real, it's still fun.
I think telling children about the real st nicholas is a great idea. All this make believe stuff is Very very tricky though to get right!
Hey Shelly! Thanks for posting. Our boys really love the story of St Nic - adventure and bravery and rescue and flying animals! I'm planning on creating a 're-enactment' of the rescue of the sisters (without going into the detail of why they were imprisoned!!!) tomorrow for them. ;-)
DeleteIt also great to ask older Christians how they approach it, but I think the culture around Christmas has changed so much in the last 20 years - it is alot harder today to take an approach of trying to separate from all the commercialism than just a couple of decades ago. I've found it better to ask what questions they asked not what answers they came to as the same good questions will help us now even though we might well have slightly different answers because of the change in culture. This is even more true of Halloween which has exploded in the last ten years.
Having had a little look around the net, I think I was getting muddled - the Devil is Old Nick (an old English name for him), not Saint Nick. Santa does share some similarities with the Norse god Thor, who rode the flying goats Gnasher and Biter, and who was also known as Donnar (another reindeer name). One website said something about him going down chimnies, though that's not one I'd heard before.
ReplyDeleteGnasher, Biter and Donnar - that's a cool bit of mythology to add.
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