It’s Christmas time again, and what do you say when your children ask if Santa is real? Is celebrating Christmas with reindeer and a red sleigh and a jolly fat man, the right thing to do?
Research with children aged between 9 and 12 years of age who no longer believed in Santa, showed that they were glad they had believed in Santa when they were younger. For most, it had taken some time for them to work out that Santa was a myth (Usually this happened when they realised he couldn’t deliver all those presents in one night).
Most children work out for themselves that Santa cannot deliver presents to everyone, know what every child wants (since even their parents don’t know!) or buy/store all the gifts required as they learn and understand more about the world around them.
Children naturally move from belonging to the group of children who believe in Santa to the group of children who don’t. The disillusion of "knowing" is far less than when an adult tells the children, because the children get that great sense of pride from working out about Santa for themselves. When they do, they feel proud and more "grown up". Most say they would have felt cheated if someone had told them because working it out was "part of growing-up"— interestingly, children who were told rarely believed the teller! And children who had worked Santa out for themselves, usually wanted to keep the myth going for their own children. Many described how they still wanted to "believe" in the myth of Santa because it made Christmas more magical—some adults also explained how they had suspended disbelief by choice until they felt ready to confront the ‘real world’ out there.
Surprisingly, we never really give up believing that Santa exists… even when we know he doesn’t! Believing is part of the magic of Christmas and if we get too factual about it all, then Christmas tends to lose its sparkle. And we do so need sparkly moments.
The legend of Santa has been around for a very long time:
Research with children aged between 9 and 12 years of age who no longer believed in Santa, showed that they were glad they had believed in Santa when they were younger. For most, it had taken some time for them to work out that Santa was a myth (Usually this happened when they realised he couldn’t deliver all those presents in one night).
Most children work out for themselves that Santa cannot deliver presents to everyone, know what every child wants (since even their parents don’t know!) or buy/store all the gifts required as they learn and understand more about the world around them.
Children naturally move from belonging to the group of children who believe in Santa to the group of children who don’t. The disillusion of "knowing" is far less than when an adult tells the children, because the children get that great sense of pride from working out about Santa for themselves. When they do, they feel proud and more "grown up". Most say they would have felt cheated if someone had told them because working it out was "part of growing-up"— interestingly, children who were told rarely believed the teller! And children who had worked Santa out for themselves, usually wanted to keep the myth going for their own children. Many described how they still wanted to "believe" in the myth of Santa because it made Christmas more magical—some adults also explained how they had suspended disbelief by choice until they felt ready to confront the ‘real world’ out there.
Surprisingly, we never really give up believing that Santa exists… even when we know he doesn’t! Believing is part of the magic of Christmas and if we get too factual about it all, then Christmas tends to lose its sparkle. And we do so need sparkly moments.
The legend of Santa has been around for a very long time:
- He originated in Pagan folklore as the god Woden or Odin. He brought presents at the time of the midwinter festival.
- St. Nicholas was an actual person and benefactor to the poor and marginalised. He was bishop of Myra, in Lycia, Asia Minor, in the first part of the fourth century of the Christian era.
- After the 16th Century, Saints were out of favour so Santa Claus was adopted as the gift-giver in England.
- The addition of elves as shop workers and Rudolph are more recent, dating back to an advertising campaign in1939.
But, to believe in Santa Claus is to also believe in magic. Even the grinches among us remember the wonder we felt as children to think there was a jolly big fat man with a white beard and a Ho-Ho-Ho in an ill-fitting red suit (and some of us even wished he would get stuck in the chimney so we could finally meet him) that wasn't bound by the rules of this drab world. I am also in total agreement with J.R. Tolkien, who believed that myths and fairy tales are valuable to enlivening the imagination and keeping minds open to the things unseen. Einstein also, believed in the magic of fairy tales to stimulate and enhance a child’s intelligence.
Families all over the world have legends and stories about a mythical person like Santa Claus (remember the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy?) and young children love to believe in him. He's not a real person, but he represents a lot of the things that are good, like kindness, generosity, and fun. Do our children perhaps also learn the ground rules of theology on the lap of Santa Claus? “He sees you when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake, he knows if you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake.” Little kids furthermore (sometimes adults too!) need all the make-believe they can get their minds on in this cold and cruel world, especially when it inspires what is good and noble and just.
I would not be the only one, however, to encourage parents to explore the true meaning of Christmas with their children. There is a remarkable miracle at the heart of Christmas, and it has nothing to do with our being naughty or nice or getting gifts in our Christmas stockings. About 2000 years ago God sent his only son to take on the form of a human being with the sole purpose to die for our sins. It has to do with the incarnation of the Son of God, that the 2nd Person of the undivided Holy Trinity became a human being in the womb of the virgin Mary and was born into this world for one reason only: to sacrifice his life in order to save ours. And this is the true magic of Christmas.
Http://ww.familiesonline.co.uk
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/santaclaus.html
http://www.family.org/fmedia/askdrbill/a0029200.cfm
http://www.holytrinity.ms.htm
http://www.thehollandring.com/truestory.shtml
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