Do Christian kids believe in Santa Claus?

I used to get upset when I saw people replace the word ‘Christmas’ with ‘Xmas.’ I saw this abbreviation as another attempt to cross Christ out of Christmas. After blustering on about this at some length to all that would listen, I decided that I’d look up the origin and meaning of the little offensive word in order to give myself more bluster ammo. I was embarrassed, yet relieved, to find out that the word was not an anti Christ conspiracy after all. The symbol ‘X’ is simply a Greek abbreviation the represents the word ‘Christ’ and therefore Jesus, and has been around and used by Christians for hundreds of years.

Although I still believe that Xmas has become a clever way to stay politically correct, I learned a valuable lesson about ranting and raving before I’ve done a little research. Which brings me to the point of my blog;

I was shocked to learn that apparently 85% of kids under 8 are led to believe in a ‘literal’ Santa. Given the percentage of us who claim to be Christians, that means that many Christian children believe that Santa Claus celebrates Jesus’ birthday.This gives rise to meaningful questions such as, who is Saint Nicholas? How did he become Santa Claus? Is he an affront to the true meaning of Christmas and as Christian parents, what should we tell our kids about him? But before I bluster, let’s look at the history.

Nicholas was an actual person who lived in what is present day Turkey, about 300 years after Jesus walked the earth. He was the son of a rich noble man and inherited much when his parents died. He was a very devout man who served God all of his life. He was especially known for his generosity. One legend says that when Nicholas heard of a man who could not afford to marry off his daughters because they had no dowry, he conspired to secretly help. As each daughter came of age, Nicholas threw a small bag of gold through the window for her dowry. The third and final gift landed in the girl’s stocking which was hung by the fire to dry. This time the father caught and thanked Nicholas and the word spread. Consequently, for many years after, anonymous gifts were thought to have come from Nicholas.

Several miracles were attributed to Nicholas while he was alive and his reputation spanned several countries. After he died, December 6th was named Saint Nicholas day and children left out stockings or shoes the night before, and in the morning they were full of either goodies or coal (an antiquated and bad parenting idea). The stocking legend is of course the original origin of our modern day Christmas stocking.

The truth of Saint Nicholas was mixed with other myths and legends over many years and truth took a back seat to fiction. During the reformation when the Protestant Church was distinguishing and distancing itself from the Catholic church, Saint Nicholas (who since his death had become a Catholic Saint) was blessed (in several countries) with different posthumous name changes. With the name change came the need to change the new character’s history and resumé. Therefore (over a period of time), many of the non historic myths surrounding Saint Nicholas were adopted and added to the season’s celebrations. In short, protestants who didn’t want to believe in the real Saint Nicholas gave him a name change and started promoting the idea of believing in a fictional character. (Anyone else see some irony here.)

The Dutch had changed Saint Nicholas’ name to Sinter Claus and when they emigrated to New Amsterdam (which later became New York), the name’s English pronunciation eventually morphed into Santa Claus. Our idea of Santa grew from there. Clement Clarke Moore, another devout Christian, wrote a poem he called, ‘A Visit From St. Nicholas.’ Today it is known as ‘The Night Before Christmas.’ That poem pulled together some of these myths and ideas that had originally come from the life of St. Nicholas and/or had been changed and added to the protestant version. It attempted to weave them into one fun tale that Moore wrote as a lark for his children. He called the poem a ‘mere trifle’ and he’d roll over in his grave if he knew that for many families, it had become a replacement for the real Christmas story.

Saint Nicholas day was and is still celebrated in many countries around the world. However, here in North America, we blended all the myths and legends surrounding Saint Nicholas and/or Santa Claus (as they were brought here from other countries like Holland) with our Christmas celebration.

Over the years, advertisers, authors, TV shows and movies have further shaped the myth of Santa Claus into the story we tell our children today.

That is perhaps an over simplified history, but it serves its purpose which was to allow me to bluster. So let me begin. For the sake of brevity (because I tend to get long winded when I’m blustering), I’ll frame my thoughts in the form of three simple answers to three complicated questions.

Shouldn’t Christmas be simply about the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?

As Christians celebrating Christmas, we should make great efforts to keep Jesus at the center of Christmas. I always put the manger scene front and center. When my children were younger, we always read the Christmas story from the Bible either on Christmas Eve or on Christmas morning. We would pray and focus on Christ before we opened presents and before each holiday meal, we took extra time to thank him for his wonderful gift. We also talk about the Christian origins of the Christmas Tree and Stocking.

Isn’t it wrong and possibly damaging to children to lie to them about Santa Claus?

This is an age-old question and one that has sparked many arguments. Studies have been commissioned and concluded that no lasting damage is done to kids who have been raised with this deception. The main argument supporting the deception is that it’s a cultural, just-for-fun lie, propagated by the whole population and not a parental deception alone. Therefore, it should not negatively affect a child’s trust for his or her parents. Unfortunately, this argument doesn’t deal with all of the issues.

Although I wouldn’t go as far as to say that you are wrong if you tell your children that Santa Claus (as we know him) is real, I will tell you I think you’re missing out on something greater.

First, the story of Santa Claus (which we’ve been embellishing with new imaginative ideas for hundreds of years) tends to be more exciting to a young child then the manger story. If your child is keyed into believing that Santa, elves, Rudolph and a BIG bag of toys are real, for them Christmas will be mainly about Santa and toys. 

Next, I think we do our children a disservice when we don’t expect them to understand or know truth from error until they are eight or ten. These are the formative years where our children are learning more than they’ll learn for the rest of their lives. When Jesus was twelve, he was wowing the religious leaders with his understanding of the truth. Furthermore, I don’t think we should ever lie to our children (or anyone else) about anything. God’s Word is clear on that topic.

Finally, I think that a practice that is based on two very faulty foundations (using a lie to control your child’s behavior [if they're bad they won't get a visit from Santa] and wanting to distance ourselves from the real Saint Nicholas because he was Catholic) should perhaps be rethought. Also, there’s a way to have all the fun without lying to our children..

Is it possible to have a Christ-centered Christmas and still enjoy some of the fanciful cultural excitement known as Santa Claus?

Yes! After reading the brief history of Santa Claus, it becomes evident why a reported 85% of parents today lie to their kids about Santa. One lie leads to another. It started out with telling 4th and 5th century kids that St. Nick might fill their stockings if they were good. Then protestants didn’t want to promote a Catholic Saint, but they still wanted the holiday so they expanded the deception.

Could we get back to the truth, parent well and endorse a great man of God without caring what church he attended?

Try this, tell your children about the real Saint Nicholas and the origins of the Christmas Stocking. Instead of telling them that they have to be good to get stuff, teach them what Saint Nicholas knew; God wants us to be generous and to give to others unselfishly like God did when he gave us his only Son. Now start a tradition of everyone putting little gifts in each other’s stockings.

Tell your kids how today’s Santa came about but don’t bah humbug the whole thing. Focus on the real Saint Nicholas but let the rest of the story ride as a bit of cultural fun. My kids always knew the truth but we gave a place for the imaginary add-ons. Do children enjoy Disney’s animated movies or the fiction books that we read them any less because they know that they’re not real stories? We as a family built snowmen and sang about frosty, we watched the animated Christmas shows and we included the silly and fun Christmas songs in with the traditional ones when we played our Christmas music. Before the kids went to bed, they put out cookies and coffee for Santa. We probably had more fun with this than anyone else because everyone knew it was a charade and played it up to the hilt, with winks and nods and the kids pretending to be suspicious about how Saint Nick seemed to like his coffee exactly how dad liked it, and lots more joking.

In the end, our Christmases were more focused on Jesus’ birth because my children knew what was real and important and what was just for fun.

Many years ago as a young Christian (when I was prone to bluster before the research was done), I used to call Santa and his elves, Satan Claus and his demons. However, I’m older now and hopefully a little wiser. I know the truth and that’s exactly what I’ve told my kids and will be telling my Grandkids. The truth and I plan on continuing to have a ton of fun celebrating our Lord’s birth in the culture we live in.

Rick Osborne (www.rick-osborne.com)