Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: kw1r+@andrew.cmu.edu (Kevin Whitley) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Santa Claus Message-ID: Date: 15 Jan 90 08:45:17 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 61 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu I had a number of interesting experiences with respect to Santa Claus over the Christmas holidays that I thought I would share. First, my wife (who is an adult convert to Christianity) and myself feel that we should tell our children that Santa Claus is not real, is just a story. The primary motivation is that we perceive a tendency towards the effect: age 5 - Santa Claus is real & God is real, age 10 - Santa Claus is not real therefore God is not real. We wanted to avoid this. The first thing that happened was that I was picking up my son (4) from his day care class and his teacher showed me some artwork he did. They were clipping out pictures from magazines and putting them in "windows" in little houses they had drawn. My son had found a picture of a Mary and Joseph with the infant Jesus and had constructed a little creche - similar to ones he'd seen at church and that we had shown him. The teachers at the school, which is University run and secular, were very apologetic and wrung their hands saying "we didn't want him to make a religious picture, it was his idea"; they have very strict rules against teaching or encouraging religion. I told them I wasn't bothered at all by his picture, was happy that he did it, and wouldn't mind at all if there was some discussion of religion. At the time I thought this was sort of funny. Then several days later my son came home and said something to the effect that he couldn't wait till Santa Claus came. My wife said "Well, Santa Claus isn't really coming, he's just pretend". My son then indignantly told us that Santa Claus was indeed very real, his teachers said so. I still thought this funny but I wondered about why they wouldn't mention God but would tell children lies about Santa Claus. Next Sunday I related this story to a friend at church. His reaction was one of "What! You don't let your children believe in Santa Claus? But they get so much pleasure out of it." I was surprised, and reconsidered my position. Thinking about it I realized that I tell my children the truth about everything, within my ability to tell and their ability to understand. I tell them the truth about people, about the world, about God, about everything. Why should I make this exception for Santa Claus? My wife and I haven't changed our minds, but over Christmas we didn't interfere with the deception being carried out by other parents, even going so far as to cleverly seperate our children from the others so that they wouldn't undecieve the other children (fortunately this was possible without any hurt feelings). Throughout the Christmas season I talked to various people and the reaction was universal - Santa Claus is a perfectly harmless belief for the children, why not let them believe. I cannot think this is right, why should I lie to my children in this one instance? I sort of wonder whether Santa Claus is part of a kind of secular cultural religion that is just assummed by everybody (hence the incident at the daycare). This makes me even more determined that belief in Santa Claus is inappropriate for my children, who I am trying to raise with Christian values and outlook. Anybody have any thoughts? Yours in Christ, Kevin Whitley kw1r@andrew.cmu.edu