Happy Saint Nicholas Day!
December 6th is Saint Nicholas Day, and our family celebrated this morning at breakfast and read the book Santa, are you for Real? around the table. We try to keep our focus on Jesus on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but since we live in the United States of Wal-mart and holiday commercialism, we decided as parents a few years ago that we had to come up with a reasonable answer for the occasions when our children may ask, “So, if we are going to focus on Jesus alone at Christmas, does that mean we don’t like Santa Claus?” A good friend gave us the “are you for real” book last year, and it was perfect for us to read to toddlers. It touches on the life of Saint Nicholas and how he honored God and showed love to others without seeking applause or recognition.
We are satisfied with teaching them that “Santa Claus” was a real man who did wonderful deeds of kindness and faith, and it is our belief that Jesus was a greater man than Santa Claus, performing the most sacrificial deed in history. So today we set aside some special time to ponder the life of Saint Nicholas and how God uses those who love him and put others before themselves and how that reminds us to do the same as we glorify the One who humbled himself “even to the point of death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8).
Side note: I found this paragraph online (particularly the last sentence) to be a little bit humorous (and telling as well) :
In Germany, Nikolaus is usually celebrated on a small scale. Many children put a boot called Nikolaus-Stiefel outside the front door on the night of December 5 to December 6. St. Nicholas fills the boot with gifts and sweets, and at the same time checks up on the children to see if they were good, polite and helpful the last year. If they were not, they will have a tree branch (rute) in their boots instead. Sometimes a disguised Nikolaus also visits the children at school or in their homes and asks them if they have been good (sometimes ostensibly checking his golden book for their record), handing out presents on a per-behaviour basis. This has become more lenient in recent decades. — Wikipedia
I also found a great site with great information and some neat activities to celebrate Saint Nicholas with others. Happy Saint Nick’s Day!
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6 Responses to “Happy Saint Nicholas Day!”
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My kids aren’t old enough yet for us to have to deal with the Santa issue, but I’ve been pondering how to maneuver around/through it since I became a mom. That book sounds like a good balance with the focus in the right place! Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for this! We don’t “do” Santa either, but have taught Bella the same thing…that there was a real Santa long ago, but that now we just remember what he did. I’m sure people think we’re the meanest parents ever to tell our child “no honey, that’s just a pretend Santa over there that the kids are flocking around”…but they don’t hear the whole story
Thanks for the links.
xxoo,
sara
Hannah Grace learned about Saint Nick in school this past week. She was so excited. I learned that they would put their shoes outside the windows…I thought that was neat to learn where our tradtion of stockings came from. While a guest speaker was talking to them they all had to take their shoes off and leave them in the hallway and when it was over they all had bags of fruit in their shoes!
Hey Kristi,
Thanks for this post. Although my group of friends and I here at Samford still have a few years before we have to start seriously thinking about this (ha), we’ve actually been discussing this issue lately. Unfortunately, we must have gotten a little loud in Starbucks the other day. Other customers found it amusing, though…haha. That’s a very interesting perspective though. I’ve been getting more and more uncomfortable with the whole Santa thing over the past couple years, but that sounds like a very good idea.
Hope all is well with you guys! Merry Christmas!
Thanks for sharing. A very helpful reminder of how to deal with Santa Claus craziness. And… I am just giggling about that definition from Wikipedia!
I came across your blog while googling today, and have been reading through it. Thanks for this book suggestion. We don’t do santa with our 4 year old either, and I’ve been looking for a book to read to her. She didn’t know anything about Santa, till she started a Play-School… and they sang a song called, “Must be Santa by Raffi”… she really never asked much about it…