ALL ABOUT SANTA CLAUS

4th century: Historical evidence shows that St. Nicholas never existed as a human. He was rather a Christianized version of various Pagan sea gods --the Greek god Poseidon, the Roman god Neptune, and the Teutonic god HoldNickar. In the early centuries of the Christian church, many Pagan gods and goddesses were humanized and converted to Christian saints. When the church created the persona of St. Nicholas, they adopted Poseidon's title "the Sailor." They picked up his last name from Nickar. Various temples of Poseidon became shrines of St. Nicholas. St. Nicholas also adopted some of the qualities of "The Grandmother" or Befana from Italy. She was said to have filled children's stockings with gifts. Her shrine at Bari became a shrine to St. Nicholas. Christianity created a life history for St. Nicholas. He was given the name  Hagios Nikolaos (a.k.a. St. Nicholas of Myra). He was said to have died in either 345 or 352 CE. He was the Bishop of Myra in Lycia (now Turkey). He is alleged to have attended the first council of Nicea; however, his name does not appear on lists of attending bishops. He is honored as a Patron Saint in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Russia, Sicily, and Switzerland.He is the patron saint of children and sailors. Many legends and miracles are attributed to him:

When he was an infant, his mother only nursed him on Wednesdays and Fridays; he fasted the remaining days. He halted a storm at sea to save three drowning sailors.

During his lifetime, he adored children and often threw gifts anonymously into the windows of their homes.

During his lifetime, he adored children and often threw gifts anonymously into the windows of their homes.

His father left him a fortune which he used to help poor children

10th century: Metaphrastes collected and wrote many traditional legends about St. Nicholas.

19th century: St. Nicholas was superseded in much of Europe by Christkindlein, the Christ child, who delivered gifts in secret to the children. He traveled with a dwarf-like helper called Pelznickel (a.k.a. Belsnickle) or with St. Nicholas-like figures. Eventually, all three were combined into the image that we now know as Santa Claus. "Christkindlein" became Kriss Kringle.

Santa would visit over 1500 homes per second. The average speed of the sleigh would be on the order of 3.6 million miles an hour (sufficient time to travel to the moon in about 4 minutes, except that the reindeer need a steady supply of oxygen.) The acceleration and deceleration loads on the reindeer, Santa and the sleigh would be astronomical. The sleigh would carry about 156,000 tons of cargo, about twice the weight of the Queen Mary. The sleigh would carry about 31 million cubic feet of cargo, about equal to 1,500 homes.

The theology of Santa Santa, as taught to most children, has most of the attributes of God: He is virtually omnipresent. He can visit hundreds of millions of homes in one night.  He is omniscient. He monitors each child; he is all-seeing and all-knowing; he knows when they are bad and good. Although not omnipotent, he does have great powers. He can manufacture gifts for hundreds of millions of children, and deliver them in one night -- each to the correct child.

He is all-good and all-just. He judges which children have shown good behavior and rewards them appropriately. Bad children are bypassed or receive a lump of coal. He is eternal.  He rewards good and punishes bad behavior.

However, there are negative aspects to Santa's behavior that can damage a child's self-esteem:

In practice, children are not rewarded with gifts according to their behavior; they receive presents according to the amount of money that their parents are willing or able to spend on them at Christmas time. A child may receive little or nothing from Santa because his/her parents are poor. Unfortunately, the child has probably adsorbed from the media and their friends only bad children get nothing from Santa. He/she might begin to look upon themselves as a bad person.

Children in Muslim, Jewish or some other faith traditions do not receive gifts from Santa. But when they go to school, they see that their Christian contemporaries have been given presents. They might feel that they are less worthy than their friends, or that their religion is inferior to Christianity.

Santa Claus is an important part of childhood: Carleton Kendrick, Ed.M., LCSW believes that "all children have the right to be fascinated and enchanted by the nurturing, age-old myths and fables of their culture. Santa Claus, and yes, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy engage a young child's sense of wonder." He implies in his essay that parents should originally teach their children that Santa exists. He suggests that when the children develop doubts about the reality of Santa, that the parents refrain from admitting the truth. Rather, they should stand by to support their kids when his/her "fantasies and myths grudgingly give way to more mature, confusing realities."

Belief in Santa is useful: Gary Grassl believes that children can grasp the concept of Santa Claus much more easily than they can comprehend God. At a young age, they can understand a quasi-deity who can make presents, and deliver them under magical circumstances to all of the children of the world. Santa is a type of simplified God. Once children understand how Santa works, it is a relatively simple step to abandon him and accept an omnipotent, omniscient, all-loving and all-just God.

How Santa saved Christmas vacation for federal employees:

The United States Code, section 5 USC 6103 declares ten national, legal, public holidays. Nine are secular; only Christmas has significant religious content. Cincinnati attorney Richard Ganulin filed a lawsuit on 1998-AUG-4 in U.S. district court,asking that the federal government be required to not declare future DEC-25 holidays.  His goal is not to terminate Christmas; he wants Federal Employees to be able to take DEC-25 off if they wish as an extra vacation day. He feels that "Christmas is a religious holiday and the Congress of the United States is not constitutionally permitted to endorse or aid any religion, purposefully or otherwise, or [promote] entanglement between our government and religious beliefs." Judge Susan Dlott dismissed the suit. According to ReligionToday for 1999-DEC-8, Judge Dlott decided "that Christmas can be observed as a federal holiday because non-Christians also mark the holiday by celebrating the arrival of Santa Claus. Since nonreligious people also observe the holiday, giving federal workers a day off for Christmas does not elevate one religion over another." Presumably, the Federal government is now free to declare a holiday at Easter, because so many Americans celebrate the secular Easter bunny fertility symbol. Ganulin has promised to appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Santa Claus has at least temporarily saved Christmas, both for Christians and for others!