Escaping the Santa Trap

I got a bit worked up over the weekend, for you see, some well-meaning person, at church, told my children that Santa is real. Obviously, I had problems with that on so many levels because I never expected that to happen. That particular situation now dealt with and behind me, I hope, did, however, get me to thinking really hard about Christmas, “the real meaning”, tradition, and Santa’s place.

You may wonder why I got all in a tizzy over a harmless, rotund, red-suited, jolly old man whose aim is to simply spread Christmas cheer and gifts. Santa, my friends, (and I hate to burst your bubble if this is the first time you’ve ever heard this) is not real. Legend has inflated this fictitious individual, loosely based on a Greek man named Nicholas, a devout man, who secretly gave gifts and put coins in shoes left outside. Now-a-days, Santa Claus leaves presents only for good girls and boys, his helpful elves are hard at work making toys all year round, he carries these bountiful toys in one very large sack… in a sleigh drawn by flying reindeer, he travels around the world shimmying his extra large girth up and down chimneys (even the houses without chimneys), and to ensure that boys and girls have been “good” he now leaves his Elf on a Shelf to watch over them and to report their behavior back to the North Pole.

Seriously? Seriously.

I love literature, and I love fiction. I love a good book, a little far-fetched time travel, a little mystery, a little illogic, and I celebrate such imagination. The Lord of the Rings trilogy, full of magic, intrigue, and a quest of biblical proportions is a series worth applauding. What I detest, though, is the telling of a falsehood, especially to children who are still learning the difference between concrete and abstract thinking. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is not written for impressionable children, and though I was an adolescent when I read them, I was at least to the level of development in critical thinking that had reached the abstract, knowing and understanding the difference between reality and fantasy.

You tell a 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7 year old that Santa is real and they believe you. You tell them that if they’re good, and the Elf on the Shelf is watching them to report back to Santa any and every infraction of behavior, they’ll get presents, and they’ll believe you. You tell them that Santa comes down the chimney, leaves perfectly wrapped toys, and eats the cookies and drinks the milk you leave out, they’ll believe you. You tell them his sleigh is driven by Rudolph the red nosed reindeer and company, they’ll believe you.

And then you tell them that we celebrate Jesus’ birthday on Christmas. You tell them that everything in the Bible is true. You tell them God created the world in 6 days and on the 7th day he rested. You tell them all the Old Testament stories about the 10 commandments, Noah and the Ark, Moses and the Red Sea, David and Goliath, and then move into the New Testament miracles of Jesus healing the blind, the lame, and the sick. You tell them Jesus died on the cross for their sins and rose on the third day and now sits at the right hand of God the Father. THEY WILL BELIEVE YOU.

What happens when you suddenly tell them that Santa isn’t real, or worse, if they learn it from someone else? What happens to what they believe about the Bible, about God, and about his Son, Jesus?

You have just effectively lost your right to be believed on every level.

They will have discovered that you purposefully lied. It is a crippling, jarring, shocking thing for dishonesty to be unearthed at any age within any relationship, but at a tender, vulnerable age you will have successfully raped their trust and caused them to question anything that further emerges from your lips. As Christian parents, we are charged with protecting, teaching, and leading our children to Christ. Propagating a falsehood is not a way to win your children to the Lord. And coercing ‘good’ behavior so children will want to act right to get presents does children a disservice because it completely misses the mark, which is their hearts.

You may think I’m harsh, overreacting, and perhaps even overly pious, but for me, playing up the Santa card because it’s fun and it’s customary and it’s ‘just what we do’ is not worth playing with my children’s eternity. Allowing them to believe a lie, no matter how harmless it may seem, is still allowing them to believe a lie. Jeff and I do not lie to our children, nor do we perpetuate lies, even if they be based on the practices that have been in our families for years. My father told me that he was devastated when he learned that Santa wasn’t real, and just a few days ago, another friend confessed the same thing. Therefore, I do not relinquish my right to share truth with my children, for when I stand before Holy God, and remember, you will too, what will I say to that charge?

I am not condemning you for playing along with Santa, but I challenge you to investigate the heart of why you do what you do.

Even as I type, I will readily acknowledge that we have allowed our children to read books about Santa, watch Christmas cartoons where he’s a main character, color pictures about him and his team of elves and reindeer. But, after each viewing, I quiz them: “Is Santa real? No. He is pretend. What is Christmas really about? Yes, it’s about Jesus. What did Jesus do for us?”...and so on.

But now I ask myself if that is enough. If we truly want to make Christmas about Jesus, what do we need to cut out? What do we need to purge? And what do we need to change?

Jeff and I had this conversation just last night. We’ve explained to our children about gift-giving, that since Jesus gave the ultimate gift of His life, we honor his birthday by giving gifts to each other. We do retain the ‘We Three Kings’ plan, borrowed from my brother and sister-in-law. Jesus received 3 gifts from the wise men, and so do our children. I know people bake a birthday cake for Jesus, but I want to know how else can we truly merit celebrating His day, for Him, when materialism and traditions tend to usurp the intent of the day?

I don’t have a complete answer, but I do know that by elevating Christ and dethroning Santa and his not-so-helpful Elf on the Shelf, we’re at least headed in the right direction.