Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod!wuarchive!ukma!seismo!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: hetyei@athena.mit.edu (Gabor Hetyei) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Santa Claus as Swastika/Hammer and Sickle Message-ID: Date: 15 Jan 91 10:09:48 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lines: 27 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , reedj@hplsla.lsid.hp.com (Reed Jacobsen) writes: |> Somehow it bothers me when - even at the Church Christmas social - we |> follow up a nice spiritual portrayal of the nativity with Santa charging |> in to pass out goody bags. I like both traditions - but somehow juxtaposing |> them that closely makes me cringe of sacrilege. I am sorry if I repeat something that has already been stated before (I just started to read this thread) but I would like to stress that the tradition of Santa bringing gifts at Christmas, is typically an Anglo-Saxon tradition. As far as I know the same tradition holds in England. Meanwhile in Germany, in Hungary and at lot of other places, the feast of Santa Claus is the 6th of December, the day of Saint Nicholas according to Catholic Calendar. Saint Nicho- las was a bishop, who helped the poor by literally "smuggling in" his gifts into their dwellings.-the same way as Santa brings his gifts to the children. (He was not climbing through the chimney though :-)- BTW this climbing through the chimney busyness has also been invented by the Anglo-Saxons, I guess. ) His most famous good deed was helping a father out with money so that his daughter could get married - and saving the girl from becoming immoral. It surprised me always that protestants, usually very sensitive about cult of saints otherwise, also propagate the cult of Saint Nicholas. Meanwhile, knowing the legend of Saint Nicholas, I always considered Santa as a very Christian figure. No wonder that in communist Hungary a "Father Winter" has been invented by the authorities, in order to avoid the allusion to Saint Nicholas. I might be wrong, but I think Saint Nicholas was a bishop in an Eastern Church- so it is not surprising that the more West we go, the less people know about the real origins of Santa.(I recall that French have a Pere Noel= Father Christmas, which is also a distortion of the original Santa Claus- tradition.) Gabor Hetyei