Santa...a tale of terror

I shared on this blog last year about how our youngest daughter developed a fear of Santa. In reality it was more than just a fear. She was terrified. She was so terrified that simply driving by the mall caused her to be gripped with fear to the point of being petrified. Well another year has gone by and I was preparing for another season of trying to minimize the impact of Santa on our Christmas celebrations. As Santa began to appear in advertising and on T.V. a strange thing was happening. My daughter was not crying or running out of the room. My daughter had made peace with Santa and declared that she "didn't hate Santa anymore" with a face that showed just how proud she was for making this step and maturing into a big girl. Times had changed...that was until we were at an event where Santa made a live appearance. We had warned her that he was coming but she insisted that everything was fine. We noticed, however, that as the time of his visit approached, she became quieter, she edged ever closer to her mother, squeezed her mother's hand ever tighter and began to dawn that petrified demeanor that we were used to seeing. Seeing him on T.V. was one thing, but as it turns out she still has a definite fear of Santa Claus. She approached him to receive a gift (with her mother close to her side) and when he asked if she was going to come and sit on his knee she politely replied "No thank you, I don't like you."
This ongoing saga has caused me to think about Santa a bit differently, to consider our Christmas traditions in a new light and has challenged me to celebrate a bit differently. This year I was thinking about the origins of our Santa Claus. I don't need to get into the whole history, and by simply googling it yourself you can find lots of information. One common feature found in almost all histories is a connection back to the historical person of St. Nicholas. The history of St. Nicholas itself is a bit clouded by myth and legend and hard to figure out but there were a few facts that seem fairly certain and worth mentioning.

1) St. Nicholas was the Bishop of Myrna and was present at the Counsel of Nicaea in the year 325 AD. It was at this counsel that leaders in the Christian church worked through intense theological concepts. It was from this counsel that much of how we understand and express some of our theology such as the Trinity derived. The Nicaean creed comes from this counsel. He was deeply concerned and involved in theology.
2) He seems to have had very wealthy parents who died when he was young, leaving him great wealth. He took the word of Jesus to sell everything and give to the poor quite literally and he used his whole inheritance to support the poor and needy.
3) Under the emperor Diocletian persecution against Christians broke out. He was persecuted, exiled and imprisoned for the faith.

I don't know how much our current image of Santa brings to mind such things as theology and Truth, sacrificial giving and persecution for the faith, but I will be thinking about these things this year, and what that may mean for me.