Since we are in the midst of the twelve days, I thought I’d post one further on Christmas. Many of us grew up singing a song about Santa Claus coming to town. We had it drilled in our heads that the guy was keeping score. He had a list and he was all knowing. Nothing could escape him. My sister and I deduced who Santa was because of these lyrics. Who else but our parents knew our sleep habits and our behavior in great detail? I won’t say at what age we became so clever. Yet Christmas is about God. This mixed message of Santa and Jesus is more than just blurring the lines between legend and truth as I previously wrote about. The idea of an all knowing magical figure who keeps record of our moral behavior and rewards us accordingly, landing smack into the celebration of the birth of Jesus is troublesome to say the least. I gotta think that even for the masses of us who figured out what was true and what was myth about this holiday, our perceptions of God were distorted. Not that any would equate Santa with God, but the comparison is almost inevitable. Jesus comes on Christmas Day. Jesus is God. God knows all and will punish the wicked and reward the righteous. Can we blame moralism and the distortion of Christianity on Santa? Probably not because if we did not have Santa, we as fallen creatures would easily enough find other ways to distort the truth about God. Yet, why do Christians so quickly and easily embrace Santa? Why when I share these thoughts with others do I get blank stares? One of my sons commented the other day that these thoughts make sense but no one wants to really face them. We are too emotionally invested in the traditions of Christmas. It’s like talking about hot button issues such as homosexuality. I’ll save that for another post.
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