Believing in Christmas from Santa to Christ
I lost the argument with my wife. Should we encourage our children’s faith in Santa Claus? I was concerned that doing so might later undermine both our credibility as parents and our children’s belief in God.
It may not be a conversation that most couples have. Then again, must couples don’t include a former Jehovah’s Witness who was raised without holidays. As a child, I absorbed the cold hard truth dispensed from my parents. There was no Santa Claus. Other children’s parents cruelly lied to them. The privilege of knowing the truth served as consolation for receiving no presents.
Though I’ve long since rejected Jehovah’s Witness beliefs, my parents’ reasoning regarding the Santa fantasy lingered. Is there value in believing in something which is not true?
That question deserves careful consideration, and serves as a check against adult beliefs. In our postmodern, politically correct society, we commonly hear ecumenical equivocations like, “There are many paths to God.” While sharing my Christian faith, friends have more than once told me, “That’s your truth.” That rebuke stops short of saying my faith is false, claiming only that it is no more or less true than any other. But if that proves somehow valid, if one person’s faith in a flying spaghetti monster is no more or less true than my faith in Jesus Christ, what value is there in holding to either?
“Exactly!” an atheist might say. “Faith in Jesus is no better than faith in either Santa Claus or the flights of a pasta god.”
In Leonard Peikoff’s The Ominous Parallels, the ardent atheist and intellectual heir to objectivist philosopher Ayn Rand defines faith as the opposite of reason:
“Faith” designates blind acceptance of a certain ideational content, acceptance induced by feeling in the absence of evidence or proof.
Were this our working definition, I could agree that faith in anything is useless. However, this narrow view of faith does not encompass how the word is used in our culture. When a husband expresses faith in his wife, is he necessarily doing so in the absence of evidence? Or is his faith a bet made on the basis of past experience and intimate knowledge of her characteristics? Either scenario is possible, and surely men and women have been known to invest faith blindly. However, as a friend to a married person, we would not encourage blind faith in the same manner we would that informed by evidence.
Love this, belief based in fact, history and personal conviction, as is my faith. Wish I could get friends and family to read this. Explains what and why I believe but I am not as good at expressing.
Elizabeth
“Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and I want you to remember this, that love… true love never dies. Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in.” -Hub (Second Hand Lions) by Tim McCanlies
I believe in Natalie Wood. The pint sized Natalie was convinced by the evidence. Case closed.
Merry Christmas to all, regardless of what you believe in.
I find the intensity with which so many parents guard and perpetuate the Santa myth with their children, odd. Charitably, one could say that it is a way of preserving their childhood innocence as long as possible. Uncharitably, it is a way of the adults maintaining the power to control their children’s beliefs as long as possible. It certainly could establish in the child’s mind the eventual fact that parents do not always tell the truth in the transmission of their beliefs, but how that plays out in the long run, I can’t say. Santa, like Christmas trees is an almost completely secular aspect of the holiday, but Christianity, at least Catholicism, has certainly shown that it can adapt to a culture’s other gods and goddesses.
When Christian parents sell Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy as real they are lying to their children. Children outgrow these characters and its a small step to include Jesus as just another fairy tale.
Explaining to children that Santa Claus is the spirit of giving and goodwill is the proper context. I am totally against the Santa Claus myth.
Same here. I think it’s all about “better behave so that you’ll get presents”. That isn’t what giving is all about.
Much better to tell the truth about Santa Claus – and it isn’t what you might think!
from Leibniz, “The Principles of Nature and Grace, Based on Reason” (1714):
“…now we…make use of the great…principle that nothing takes place without a sufficient reason; in other words, that nothing occurs for which it would be impossible for someone who has enough knowledge of things to give a reason adequate to determine why the thing is as it is and not otherwise. This principle having been stated, the first question which we have a right to ask will be, ‘Why is there something rather than nothing?’ …”
Man, I’d love to take credit for this quote, “Existence, the ultimate ‘Free Lunch.’
My husband’s father taught him and his brother that Santa exists as the spirit of giving and sharing in all of us, and that essentially, the guys in the red suits were reminders of that generous spirit. I have always liked that.
Merry Christmas, all!
I agree; well said. I hung onto the Santa myth long past when others had discarded it, partly to play along so that my younger sister and nieces and nephews were not disappointed. I did not feel betrayed when I found out. I felt guilty for putting such pressure on my mom, a widow with seven kids at home trying to make Christmas as good as possible for us.
I know it’s lying to children, but I’m not sure it’s actually harmful. The Learning About Santa is a coming of age, a step in growing up. If children come to regard Jesus as a mythical character like the tooth fairy and Santa…that’s more a reflection of the parents’ attitudes toward God and how they teach about Jesus.
Also, they learn that myth-making can be used to model the world. The Santa story is so benign to normal folks that I question the motives of anyone who sees the Santa myth as a roadblock to human development. We tell our kids myths all the time, except, THOSE myths we believe. We forget that we’ve never seen a vitamin and ‘science’ doesn’t support keeping warm to prevent colds. Yet, I defy any parent to suggest that we shouldn’t keep our children well outfitted during the winter, and that their health doesn’t suffer as a result of not doing so.
A child is not a toy. Parents tell their children about Santa because they think their ignorance is adorable.
Exactly.
It’s an abuse of innocence.
If done right, parents can avoid the two extremes of teaching fantasy and lies to children on the one hand and being a grumpy wet-blanket Grinch on the other. Fostering a belief in “Santa Claus” can be a teaching tool if carefully done, a tool that leads children to Christ and His call to love one another.
Santa is real, just as God is real. But one is metaphor and the other is the real deal.
Properly understood, “Santa” is not the commercialized guy of the materialistic modern world, but is instead an icon of the Son of God Himself and, hence, a model for us. He is representative of the giving and joy that we are each called to, and which originates in God giving Himself to us on Christmas morning.
The only problem is in not locking yourself in by presenting Santa in such a fashion that one cannot then later explain exactly who “Santa” is. Yes, he was an actual real historical person by the name of Nicholas, whose feast day is December 6. And the clothes that he wears (red suit, white lining) are the real historical clothes worn by bishops. But the “Santa” of today is you and me. Santa is us, who are called to give to others.
Thus, it is probably wise, when kids see all the various “Santas” at the mall, to explain that that is not really Santa, but “Santa’s helper.” That can bridge the gap to later telling the children that “Santa” is symbolic, that the real Santa is each of us and, more importantly, that they are Santa too, they are called to self-giving.
Regarding the real St. Nicholas — he was born in Lycia, Asia Minor, and died as Bishop of Myra in 352. His uncle, the archbishop of Myra in Lycia, ordained him and appointed him abbot of a nearby monastery. At the death of the archbishop, Nicholas was chosen to fill the vacancy, and he served in this position until his death. Under the Roman Emperor Diocletian, who persecuted the Christians, St. Nicholas was arrested, taken away from his home by the pagan soldiers, and thrown into a prison at the beginning of the fourth century. He suffered the hardships of hunger, thirst, loneliness, and chains.
Released by Constantine the Great, he returned to his city, and he later attended the Council of Nicaea in 325. He died in Myra about 345.
The stories of Nicholas’ charity have become legend. A man of Patara had lost his fortune, and finding himself unable to support his three maiden daughters, was planning to turn them into the streets as prostitutes. Nicholas heard of the man’s intentions and secretly threw three bags of gold through a window into the home, thus providing dowries for the daughters. The bags of gold, tossed through an open window, are said to have landed in stockings or shoes left before the fire to dry. This led to the custom of children hanging stockings or putting out shoes, eagerly awaiting gifts from Saint Nicholas. The three bags of gold are also said to be the origin of the three gold balls that form the emblem of pawnbrokers.
Saint Nicholas labored to stop the worship of false gods. With his own hands he cut down a huge tree, site of a sacrilegious cult of the goddess Diana. During a famine his prayers multiplied the provisions of wheat which he had ordered for the port of Myra, to such an extent that what would have sufficed for his people for only a few days, was found to be sufficient for more than two years. He rescued from death, just before they were hanged, three innocents condemned by a judge who had been corrupted by money, reprehended the latter for his crime and sent these liberated ones home, entirely exonerated.
By the year 1200 St. Nicholas had captured the hearts of all European nations. Many churches, towns, provinces and countries venerate him as their patron saint. Merchants, bankers, seamen and prisoners made him their patron, too. But his main patronage is the one over little children.
My best friend from college is also a devout Catholic and this is how she handled Santa with her daughter, too. She found a children’s book with the story of St. Nicholas and used it alongside Santa so that the two were always together for her daughter – one having led to the other.
Follow the links here for more information on St. Nikola of Myra.
Children are happy with presents and a tree and a good meal with the family.
The Santa thing is utterly unnecessary. And you don’t have to say that he doesn’t exist, you could just ignore the subject.
Myths are valuable for the moral lessons they teach, not as actual history. A myth doesn’t have to be true history. It has to function as an allegory.
Aesop’s fables should be taught to children. Whether or not they believe that a tortoise and a hare actually raced at some time in the past. Some may believe it, but that’s harmless. They’ll grow out of it. Hopefully the moral lesson–persistence is eventually rewarded–will stick with them.
Santa Claus is a valuable myth because the moral lesson there is that a child should behave like a good person if he expects a reward (toys) on Christmas Day. IOW, those toys are not an entitlement, but an incentive. And making Santa Claus decide, takes the guilt away of the parents who the child might otherwise resent for not giving him the presents he expected.
You can think you have ignored it and thus your children don’t know. However, I put the question to my 2-year-old out of the blue Christmas Eve night. My husband and I are not big celebrators and have decided to gear our Christmases around a less materialistic and more Christ-centered celebration. We haven’t talked about Santa, we didn’t take him to see any Santa, but when I said tomorrow was Christmas and that Santa might come and asked what he though that might mean, he thought for a second and then said, “Toys!” Clearly, you don’t have to do anything for them to know.
I don’t think my parents ever promoted the idea that Santa was real. At least they never said anything like that. When they talked about Santa, they talked about it in terms of being an artifact of Christmas rather than an actual person. It was more like an inside joke than anything else.
I knew Santa did not exist by the time I was 6.
On the Christmas of 2001, New York City was a city with an open wound. Muslims had finally made their impact on the holiday season in a truly unforgettable way. At Ground Zero, workers were still struggling to search through the remains, looking for bodies or parts of them. “It would be like a gift for somebody,” a police officer said, who was spending his holiday searching through the debris. A gift for the non-believers on that holiday season from Islam.
While Muslims were stuffing their faces in November of 2001, Americans were mourning their dead. While Abdul, Mohammed and Raisa were picking through their lamb stew, Americans were picking up the pieces of their loved ones. And yet it was Americans who were repeatedly told to be sensitive to Muslim concerns.
From Pakistan, Musharraf urged the US to suspend bombing his Taliban allies during Ramadan… in the name of sensitivity. New York City schools were making arrangements for Muslim prayers out of “heightened sensitivity to Muslim concerns after the Sept. 11 attack”. Instead of Americans being on the receiving end of “heightened sensitivity”, the ideology that had conspired to murder them was.
On the 9th anniversary of 9/11, Islam had another gift for us. Having bought up a building damaged in their own attack, they plotted to set up a grand mosque near Ground Zero. Another gift to New Yorkers from the religion that kept on giving. Another Crescent and Star.
The same people who did not learn the lesson in 1997, and allowed the Crescent and Star to fly at the World Trade Center, were eager to let the Ground Zero Mosque go forward in the name of tolerance. But despite the Crescent and Star, appeasement proved to be no defense. 3,000 people died on 9/11 because American leaders preferred to appease, rather than confront. And we are still busy appeasing, like never before.
Allah Akbar and Ho, Ho, Ho.
Daniel Greenfield is a New York City writer and columnist. He is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and his articles appears at its Front Page Magazine site.
Get off the stand, mehng….. yer playing lousy horn……….
Sorry, I don’t speak Valley Girl.
You’re the only square in this combo, and you’re stinking up the joint. This thread is devoted to contemplations on the Prince of Peace, not an excrescence of tribalistic rage fantasy. Pack yer horn and take it elsewhere……..
“……Saint Nicholas labored to stop the worship of false gods. With his own hands he cut down a huge tree, site of a sacrilegious cult of the goddess Diana. During a famine his prayers multiplied the provisions of wheat which he had ordered for the port of Myra, to such an extent that what would have sufficed for his people for only a few days, was found to be sufficient for more than two years. He rescued from death, just before they were hanged, three innocents condemned by a judge who had been corrupted by money, reprehended the latter for his crime and sent these liberated ones home, entirely exonerated………”
An entirely reasonable syncretism is responsible for Christmas. The early church fathers saw the dread of death and the desire for life and redemption in all the solstice rites and celebrations and the straight across analogy between them and the life story of Christ and his promise of redemption. What they did was logical in the conversion of a multitude of pagan nations. In the end, I think modern nihilism did more to damage the Christian faith than the transposition of the Virgin Birth from a month before passover to the winter solstice; and a of regional, obscure saint to a transgendered Psyche……..
It happen. I felt this day was coming soon last Christmas when my 11 year old adopted son could not see how Santa could fit down the chimney but I convinced him based on his own eyes of what he saw when he was 7 when Santa came down the chimney .
In 6th grade now it was all his friends that turn him traitor on Santa Claus. But he put his arm around me and say he understands why i still believe in Santa Claus and he respects my belief
I say to him there are millions of children who still believe in Santa in heaven and one day maybe when you have your own gifts from heaven children you will have your faith restored in Santa and perhaps you do not need him so much with so much love in your life now my 12 year old adopted son
Santa Claus, the fat man in the red suit who gives out presents galore, was an invention of the Coca Cola corporation in 1929. He became a logo encouraging people to drink their product. Thus the Santa Claus of American culture is an American icon who encourages mass consumption and support for the corporate state. In early Christian traditions Saint Niklaus from whom the American sanny claws evolved was a fourth century bishop in Turkey who left money at a poor familys house in order to save their children from being sold off into slavery. In the German Christian tradition St. Niklaus comes around on December 6 dispensing candy to the children. In another German tradition Kris Kringle, a corruption of Christ Kind (Christ Child) brings gifts for the children on December 25th. The whole consumerist nightmare and desecration of the birth of Christ is an American invention; only American could have taken a sacred day and turned it into a debauch. Only Americans could take the bible and twist it into their personal interpretation of what life should be and then spend interminable amount of time arguing with each other about who is right. What we celebrate today in America on December 25th has nothing to do with the Christian feast which begins in Advent and ends on January 6th on epiphany.Puer natus est nobis
That’s why I appreciate being Catholic. Santa Claus is St. Nicholas- like St. Patrick and St. Valentine, the kids understood that his story has been modified for various reasons- to be more inclusive, to make it seem more fun, to sell more products. The whole Is Santa Real? question never came up. We didn’t conspire to put out cookies or have presents appear magically on Christmas morning, and there was no need for that. The true story of Christmas is inspiring enough.
It helps that they went to Catholic schools, so they never really focused on the red suit-wearing persona, reindeer or talking snowmen. But, if their friends believed in Santa, there wasn’t really any conflict, either. They all simply agreed he was real.
Adults over-analyze things too much. Even if we weren’t of a saint-believing denomination- or any denomination- it’s easy to avoid the entire subject and focus on the tree, presents, parties, caroling, fun family times and generosity to those less fortunate. No one needs to encourage a belief in Santa to ensure their kids enjoy Christmas. It comes naturally.
Why does society have beauty contests? It’s a coping mechanism. Man looks around, and it is fairly obvious that mankind is not one of the beautiful creatures here on Earth. We look like we all have a major case of mange (at least to our fur covered friends). We are slow, uncoordinated (by animal standards), and fairly weak. So one way to counter all that baggage is to have beauty contests. We simply keep telling ourselves we are beautiful. We are the only judge, so it works.
Religion: Why do we have it? One of the reasons is the same as the above scenario. We happen to know we are corrupt and a double dealing species. We know we are cruel to ourselves and to all other life forms. Most religions will claim that man has dominion over everyone else. That’s a very convenient take on things considering we write our religions to compensate to ourselves who we really are. religion is a way so man can live with himself, and the things he does to others.
That’s the main reason why man has religion. To cope with who we truly are.
Santa Claus is the simple manifestation of the principles that Jesus taught. He is the embodyment of kindness, generosity and forgiveness. The fact that there was a seventh century saint to model him after was serendipitous. Children do not think like adults. Giving them the example of a benificent elderly grandfather figure is a way of imparting the values that we should strive to achieve all year long but only seem to concentrate on at this time of year. Children are, for the most part, innocent and trusting. There will be plenty of time for them to become jaded and dissillusioned when they get older. Let them enjoy their innocence as long as they can.
It’s easier to make a plausible case for the existence of God, than to make a plausible case for Jesus being the Son of God who was Resurrected.
And sure enough, Jews and Muslims believe in God. (In fact, Judaism preceded both Christianity and Islam.) But Jews and Muslims don’t believe that Jesus was the Son of God.
In a court of law, the four Gospels would be dismissed as hearsay evidence. None of them is written by someone who actually saw Jesus’s Resurrection. Paul never saw Jesus come out of that cave after Resurrection. The Gospels are written by authors who heard about the Resurrection from others.
Wrong. Jesus Christ appeared in is resurrected body to His disciples three times & among those disciples were Matthew & John. His resurrected body still has the scars from the spikes used to nail Him to the cross & the scar from the spear one of the Roman soldiers plunged into His right side. Read The Gospel of John. Also there is this: http://youtu.be/MyoCGx4yeE8.
Please read the four Gospels before erroneously determining they are hearsay written by men who just heard about Jesus’ resurrection from “others”. God will open the eyes of those who honestly want to know Him & His Son. If being “reasonable” is more important than having an open mind you’re missing out on the best God has to offer. There is nothing “reasonable” about blind disbelief.
Incprrect. Matthew and John both saw Jesus after the resurrection. Mark was a close associate of Peter who also saw Jesus after the resurrection and Luke travelled with Paul who was converted and callaed as an apostle after he met Jesus on the road to Damascus again after the Resurrection.
You may refer to the Gospels as “heresay evidence” all you want. People will still believe. Thats why its called “FAITH”.
“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” says the Bible (Exodus 22:18). Jews and Christians no longer believe with absolute faith. The only doctrines that are accepted without question are Marxism and Islam. That’s why they are such good friends.
http://www.jochnowitz.net/Essays/MarxIslam.html
Sure we do. Who ever is without sin shall cast the first stone.
BTW, don’t be so confident of your ability to withstand the madness of crowds.
>The strangeness of Christianity is further evidenced in the effect Christ has upon individual lives. Inexplicable conversions like that of the apostle Paul, who up to that point was an unrelenting destroyer of Christians, demonstrate an ability to turn men from their base nature.
Which shows confirmation bias, based on a probable legend instead of an historical figure and event. What about the stories of the wayward men who found resources for straightening out their lives from other religions like Buddhism or Islam?
And what about the “strangeness” of the fact that people in well-run countries have lost interest in religion for the most part? Our deep thinkers have told us for generations that we have “god-shaped holes in our hearts” and that our longing for god and the afterlife shows the tragedy and frustrated grandeur of the human condition. After all this hype, I consider it a bit of letdown to learn from the social scientists who study religiosity that we apparently hold religious beliefs as superficial opinions to help us manage existential anxiety. People abandon these opinions in developed countries which have a few social programs, like universal health insurance, to protect them from life’s predictable adversities.
And getting back to Santa, I notice that when children learn the truth about the source of their christmas presents, they become “clausphemers” that very day and go on with their lives. They don’t experience anguish, angst, anomie, purposeless, nihilism and the other afflictions christians imagine for atheists. In fact, if you met a newly enlightened who lamented that he had based his life on a lie, and how he had nothing left to live for, the situation would sound like something from an episode of “South Park.”
Your last point about kids finding out that there is no SC is intriguing. However, one of the reasons why the kiddies don’t feel any betrayal etc. is because the gifts keep right on coming once they “figure it out”.
Now I don’t think you would see the same results if when a child tells their parents they no longer believe in SC anymore, the parents stop being Santa. The gifting is over.
You would see a very different reaction from the children.
“Superficial opinions to help us manage existential anxiety”……. umn, that’s a good one. How much money are you willing to put on that?……’>……..
While not taking everything in the Old Testement as an absolute fact, they do all believe in the divinity of Christ with absolute faith. If they don’t believe that, then they are not Christian.
Iranians are incredibly open to the gospel message of Jesus’ love and forgiveness. Many are disillusioned with the oppression of Islam and are desperate for the truth. Every day, more Iranians are hearing the hopeful message of The Way, The Truth and The Life through satellite TV broadcasts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HtsAlW1v1k&feature=player_embedded
So you believe in “Iran”?
Marilyn Hickey’s night of healing rallies over 400,000 in Pakistan
Wow! talk about 81 year old Santa’s daughter doing God’s business
http://www.christianpost.com/news/marilyn-hickeys-night-of-healing-rallies-draw-over-400000-in-pakistan-69141/
When my sisters children were about 5 and 6, they came home crying, saying that the neighbor kids had told them that Santa was a lie. She sat them down and asked, “Are there things in the world that we believe in, even though we can not see them?” Well, yes, they said, there were some that they could think of, starting with God, whom they knew to be there even if they could not see Him, and going on to many other things, including germs, which is why they washed their hands before eating.
“So,” she asked. “We agree that there are many things in the world both seen and unseen?” “Yes,” they both said.
“Do you believe in love?” she asked. “You can’t see it but you know that I love you, right?” And they agreed that they knew about love but no, you couldn’t see it.
“So, if you could see love, what would it look like?” They came up with various ideas. And then she said, “If I could see love I think it would look like a large man in a red suit, with a white beard, who delivers gifts to children on Christmas Eve.”
“Oh,” they said, “You mean that Santa Claus is love if we could see it?”
They are both grown, now, into very decent people, who know that Santa Claus is actually all around, even if you can’t see him.
Santa Claus can be good for kids as introduction to a loving God. A very young child’s world is his family; parents, siblings, grandparents, and cousins, aunts and uncles. The one, two, three year old learns Santa and Christmas by immersion and experience. The four, five, six year old learns also by asking and receiving, both for information and for gifts and toys. Who is Santa? Someone who loves you so much a whole special season of the year celebrates him bringing you presents. Goodness comes to give to you the child out of love, and not out of a love you HAVE to depend upon and which HAS to depend upon you, ie, Mom and Dad. No, the present is from someone you don’t know but he knows you. He even knows if you’ve been nice or naughty,- but soon it’s quite evident that Santa forgives the naughty!
Imagine a world where a powerful, supremely-abled person knows you, who plans and works throughout the year to brings you the toys and gifts you desire inwardly. Think about a person whose interest and personal fulfillment is bound up in caring for you and others, that you all may be merry and glad.
Yes. Presents and anticipation, a special season and decorations, a big deal of gifts just for you personally. Somebody good knows you and comes thru for you, and it is happy and it is glad. To believe ‘Santa Claus is really just your parents’ is far off the mark. Santa Claus is parents giving the gift of God with the salvation of Jesus to their little ones so they grow up into the goodness of God. Santa Claus is the first step into a love bigger and stronger than Mom’s and Dad’s, and much more able to go with that child all through his or her days on earth.
A baby born in a manger, a poor family in a stable at Christmastime – and you. I always thought Santa Claus is the best introduction a child can have to grow up in God.
between you and Mr Hudson, I believe in Santa Claus.
Yeah. When I was a kid, I thought God, Jesus and Santa had this “thing.” It was a GOOD thing. Nicely said.
While I’m thinking of it, in reference to this, by Mr. Hudson,
“In Leonard Peikoff’s The Ominous Parallels, the ardent atheist and intellectual heir to objectivist philosopher Ayn Rand defines faith as the opposite of reason…”
Ayn Rand was a lot of things, including her own worst enemy. I owe her a huge debt of gratitude. Nonetheless, her original “intellectual heir” was Nathanial Branden. And he was. He made the mistake of falling in love with someone-not- his-wife, and also not his former lover, Ayn Rand. Rand disowned him and handed the crown to Peikoff. All too human are we.
Great column Walter.
One of the ironies of the 21st century is that it is the atheists who are the ones inclined to literally “believe in invisible men in the sky”.
It takes far more faith to be an atheist than a Christian.
Spoken like a parent. Merry Christmas!
I believe in the longest night of the year. I believe in the brisk tranquility of wintertime – the season of the Water element and the rains and snows it brings. I believe in the promise of growing light and spring ahead. I believe in the décor of the season – white light to guide us peacefully through the darkest time of year, evergreen to represent endurance and vitality even in the bleak of midwinter, and red to represent the warm glow of the Sun ‘regaining its strength’ (moving northward again).
I also believe in charity, gift-giving, and the gathering of friends, families and communities at this time of year, to unwind from life’s rugged journeys, to make connections with our spiritual side, and to revel in the coming of new beginnings and the eternal flow of time.
And I affirm that this is just one of many stops along the Wheel of the Year and the cycle of life, all of which when combined give us the full and glorious beauty of Mother Nature’s rhythms and beats.
You may be right about Santa. My mother had me believing in both God and Santa. When I asked if Santa was real, she said he was a “legend” without explaining that this meant “no”. About age 8, I realized that (a) Santa is fake, and (b) God is Santa for grown-ups*, and I never believed in either again.
* P.J. O’Rourke brilliantly refutes this in Parliament of Whores, but for many a “Christian” woman, God is a sort of holy concierge who answers her prayers and stands by her side while she has sex with bad boys, has an abortion or two, cheats, divorces, and pillages a decent-but-boring husband, etc.