Giving Our Children the True Santa Clause

The Coca-Cola “bowl full of jelly” American idea of Santa Clause always felt like a shady character to me. As a child, I didn’t like the fact that he was watching me as I slept, telling me I couldn’t be sad, expecting me to sit on his lap and tell him secrets, or keeping a tally on my behaviors. As someone who tends to critically question worldly narratives, I thought, “Who does this guy think he is?”

When I became a parent, I questioned the meaning of this pot-bellied, red nosed man even more. Handing my precious child over to a strange man for a photo-op was a hard no for me. I also was very certain my God given job as a parent was to guide this sweet soul with grace, not threaten him with coal. On the flip side, I wasn’t about to try and convince my son that Christmas was all about getting lots of extravagant presents, or everything he asked for. And I most certainly wasn’t going to jeopardize the treasured bond between parent and child through betrayal, by trying to convince my son he was real when I knew he wasn’t.

Instead, we decided not to force the idea of Santa Clause. Sure, he’d hear all about Santa from the large amount of secular family members, friends, books, and modern Christmas songs. But, he was creeped out by the idea of a stranger entering our house at night (can’t blame him!), and he was absolutely terrified every time he saw someone dressed up as a character (also, understandable), so it was an easy decision. When he was old enough to start asking, we told him he represented the “idea of gift giving”.

Little did I know at the time, my distaste for the Americanized version of Santa Clause stemmed from a very deep spiritual longing. Of course I had heard the “real” Santa was Saint Nicholas, but growing up his story was overshadowed by a shallow materialistic version. However, once we came back to our faith and dove deep into the story and traditions surrounding it, we become enthusiastically giddy to include Saint Nicholas in our Christmas season.

Now, we had something even better than Santa to share with our son, we had St. Nick! As we learned more about Saint Nicholas (and realized he was actually my family’s patron saint!), we began to rejoice in the beautiful ways we could celebrate the True Santa. We were thrilled to learn of ways which didn’t feel manipulative or scary, instead they were deeply entwined with the True spirit of Christmas. We have joyfully celebrated Saint Nicholas Day every year since!

We hope you enjoy the following resources about Saint Nicholas, so you too can share the True Santa with your children.