Search This Blog

Thursday, December 30, 2021

177 Santa The Bishop

    (Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “Santa The Bishop”, originally shared on December 30, 2021. It was the 177th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)

   Santa Claus is part of the enchanted world in our culture. At least we act like it. But our cultural image of Santa is actually rooted in a historical figure who is known as the patron saint of pawnbrokers. Today, we’ll take a look at the real Santa Claus and the gift he points to that is more valuable than gold, even in inflationary times.

   I played an outdoor mall Santa, or more accurately Santa’s helper, one year when I was in high school in my hometown, Manitowoc, Wisconsin. One of my brothers says that he remembers me arriving at the mall in a helicopter. I did? I think that I would remember something like that. Memory is a funny thing. 😊

   I do remember that I was padded with a pillow and, having no beard, I glued one to my face with spirit gum. I would walk around the mall and hand out candy to children from a sack. I don’t remember how I got that job, but it was fun. Mostly.

   One evening I had stopped to give a small child some candy. His older brother was standing with their parents behind him, and he suddenly exclaimed cynically, “You’re not Santa.” I looked at the little boy, and the older brother said it again. “You’re not Santa!” I looked back at the little boy and said, “See my beard. You can pull on it.”

   The big brother reached over his younger brother’s shoulder and pulled on my beard so hard that it pulled off!

   I hustled the family into an access hall, gave everyone handfuls of candy, explained that I was a helper, and asked the boys not to ruin the experience for the other children. I was off to tend my raw face and replace my beard.  

   A fake beard wouldn’t be an issue now, of course, but I also have a bit of a different perspective on Santa.

   Popular astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson drew a lot of criticism on his Twitter account this year when he posted that, if Santa and his reindeer traveled as fast as they would need to travel in order to reach all the homes in the world in one night, they would explode!

   The response produced by that tweet indicated that most people see Santa in a different way than as a figure who is bound by the laws of physics.

   Iconic, and I do not use that word often, Christian writer C.S. Lewis, author of The Lion, the Witch and The Wardrobe, Out of the Silent Planet, and more, along with works of accessible theology such as Mere Christianity, was a close friend and colleague of J. R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and Lord of The Rings and more. Both were Christians and they disagreed on how best to convey the Christian message in a secular world. It’s my understanding that C.S. Lewis believed that allegory, where characters stood for the divine, drew the story of salvation into the realm of imagination. And, J.R. Tolkien believed that it was best to create a world in which the presence of God could be encountered rather than understood.

   For both, the enchanted world was a preface to the real world filled with the holy and the divine. Santa Claus and his elves, magical reindeer, and his impressive logistical powers fits into that category.

   Our popular image of Santa Claus has mostly to do with the pictures in the Coca Cola ads of the 1920’s and forward, and with that “jolly old elf” in the 1822 poem by Biblical scholar and professor Clement Clarke Moore, “’Twas the Night Before Christmas”.

   This year, a popular Netflix movie named “A Boy Called Christmas” took the St. Nicholas story even farther from its historical roots.

   Santa Claus is actually based on a historical figure, St. Nicholas of Myra, or just Nicholas of Myra to most Protestants. Nicholas’ traditional date of birth is March 15, 270 and his date of death is December 6, 343.

   Many cultures, including the Norwegian culture of my ancestry, mark December 6th, Nicholas’ saint day, with special traditions. When I was a child we put our shoes out on the night before and St. Nicholas filled them with candy and small gifts by the next morning.

   He was the bishop of the city of Myra, a seaport city in modern day Turkey. He was a steadfast witness for the orthodox faith, the faith delivered to the first apostles, and is thought to have been present in the First Council of Nicaea which produced the Nicene Creed. He gave his substantial inheritance “to assist the needy, the sick, and the suffering” (https://www.stnicholascenter.org/who-is-st-nicholas), was thrown in prison and tortured during a time of Christian persecution, was released and lived in such a way that he became especially meaningful to, and the patron saint of, “sailors, merchants, archers, repentant thieves, children, brewers, pawnbrokers, unmarried people, and students in various cities and countries around Europe.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Nicholas)

   He had a reputation for secret gift-giving, which gave rise to our modern understanding of Santa Claus.

   In fact, the original title given to “’Twas the Night Before Christmas” was “A Visit from St. Nicholas”.

   One story about him concerns three sisters from a poor family who were about to be forced into slavery or into prostitution because they had no doweries. Nicholas threw a sack of gold through a window of their house secretly for three nights so that their father could pay their doweries and they could get married instead. St. Nicholas is known as the patron saint of pawn brokers, which traditionally have three gold balls that recall this story hung outside their places of business to indicate that they are pawn shops.

   Likewise, Jesus paid a price to redeem us as a gift.

   Paul writes, in Romans 6:23,

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

   Jesus paid with his blood and with his innocent sufferings and death. He redeemed us from sin, death, and the power of the devil.

   Paul writes to the Ephesians, chapter 2, verses 8-10,

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

   We are gifts to others in response to the great gift of eternal life that we have received in Jesus Christ. That is who we are. It is our way of life.

   The world’s Christmas is on sale now. If you can find it. It’s mostly taken down and will have disappeared by New Year’s Day.

   Our Christmas continues for 8 more days in the 12 days of the Christmas season. What do we celebrate?

   God became flesh like ours to suffer and die like us so that we might not die but might live forever.

   John 3:16, part of Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus, was called the gospel (good news) in miniature by 16th century church reformer Martin Luther,

16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

   This is the gift that came at Christmas.

   St. Nicholas was known for giving gifts.

   Santa Claus is known for bringing gifts.

   But Jesus, God made flesh, is the gift. And we share our gifts with the world in response to the greatest gift ever given. Jesus Christ.

   We have received now the gift of the Holy Spirit. It has been poured out on us as streams of living water.

   Near the end of the last book of the Bible, in Revelation 22:17, we read,

17 The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.”
And let everyone who hears say, “Come.”
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.

   Christmas is a time of gift giving. It’s also a time of gift receiving. It can be a time for receiving the greatest gift of all time.

   Open your heart and receive the gift of God. And if you have received it, invite others to receive that gift as well.

   Make this a Christmas season that brings Santa back to his roots for you and for others.

   That would be the merriest Christmas of all!