Today (Dec. 6) is the feast day of St. Nicholas of Myra, a very important saint for Byzantine Catholics and Orthodox Christians—and the real Santa Claus. How St. Nicholas, the fourth century bishop of Myra (modern Turkey), became Santa Claus, the jolly fat man who drives magical reindeer, is a story in and of itself; but today I want to share a few of the best tales from St. Nicholas’s life. And some of them are truly movie material!
When St. Nicholas was young, he gave his large fortune entirely away to the poor. According to one story, to save three poor young women from slavery, Nicholas secretly came on three different nights and threw bags of gold through the window of the girls’ house, for their dowries. On the third night, Nicholas was caught by the girls’ grateful father, but not before his bag of gold accidentally landed in a stocking drying before the fire. That’s why children hang up Christmas stockings for Santa Claus to fill. But that’s not the only time St. Nicholas saved young people from a gruesome fate:
“[Nicholas] raised to life three young boys who had been murdered and pickled in a barrel of brine to hide the crime. These stories led to his patronage of children in general, and of barrel-makers besides.”
When St. Nicholas was young, Christianity was still a persecuted religion in the Roman empire, a religion for which one could be killed. When Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity and then called the Council of Nicaea, Nicholas and his fellow clergy were men who had truly suffered for their faith. Nicholas helped the council to formulate the Nicene Creed, which has been the standard Christian creed ever since. But Nicholas not only contributed his theological genius, he got into a fist fight with a heretic and was miraculously vindicated:
According to other traditions St. Nicholas was not only there during the Council of Nicaea in 325, but [he gave] the [blasphemous] heresiarch Arius a slap in the face. The conciliar fathers deprived him of his episcopal insignia and committed him to prison; but [Jesus Christ] and His Mother appeared there and restored to him both his liberty and his office.
As against Arianism so against paganism, St. Nicholas was tireless and often took strong measures: among other temples he destroyed was that of Artemis, the principal in the district, and the evil spirits fled howling before him [many early Christian accounts describe demons as possessing pagan temples and being exorcized by saints]. He was the guardian of his people as well in temporal affairs. The governor Eustathius had taken a bribe to condemn to death three innocent men. At the time fixed for their execution Nicholas came to the place, stayed the hands of the executioner, and released the prisoners. Then he turned to Eustathi[us] and did not cease to reproach him until he admitted his crime and expressed his penitence.
Another time, three imperial officials were condemned to death through lies and jealousy. After the men prayed to God through the intercession of the Bishop of Myra, St. Nicholas appeared in dreams to both Emperor Constantine and the prefect Ablavius, threatening them with dire spiritual consequences if they unjustly executed the men. The emperor and prefect discovered they had the same dream and freed the men, after which Constantine wrote Nicholas to beg him to pray for the peace of the world.
So the next time you see “Santa Claus,” remember that St. Nicholas was a man who was both a giver and a fighter—a man whose generosity is still inspiring people over a thousand years after his death.
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