The Santa question
I've always been in favor of the Santa tradition but had never given it much thought. I have fond memories of Santa from my childhood and wanted to pass that experience along to our kids. Lisa didn't have strong feelings one way or the other, so Santa it is. Yesterday, Rod Dreher started a discussion on whether or not one's family should keep the Santa tradition. One of the commenters linked to a Touchstone piece entitled "Yes, Aquinas, There is a Santa Claus" that addresses the question as St. Thomas Aquinas might. Here's an excerpt:
Therefore, the practice of the Santa Claus tradition is not a lie for two related reasons: First, it constitutes imaginative action that conveys metaphysical truths; second, its intention is not deception, or to lead children into error, but to give them a deeper apprehension of the truth. This it does in three important ways: First, it provides an opportunity to teach children spiritual truths of the faith such as the Communion of Saints, the Church Triumphant, and so forth.
Second, it helps cultivate those imaginative powers in children upon which the depth and richness of human knowledge depend, such as a sense of mystery and wonder, and therefore makes them more receptive to the supernatural mysteries of the faith. Finally, it helps instill in them the moral lesson of selfless giving. Just as St. Nicholas of Myra (Santa Claus) gave gifts in secret, so too, may parents give gifts secretly to their children. Nor is it presumptuous to assume that St. Nicholas approves of this custom of giving secret gifts in his name.
Another commenter pointed to the importance of having an imaginary life at the center of Cervantes' Don Quixote (one of my favorite books; the epigraphs in my dissertation came from this classic):
Sigh. Here it is again, the idea that having Santa (or even St. Nick) constitutes lying to your children.
In the great classic "Don Quixote de la Mancha," Don Quixote lives in a world of his own imagining. But a funny thing happens when he encounters 'normal' people; they find themselves pretending to see and believe in the things he does; they must enter his world in order to communicate with him. In a way, I suppose, they are 'lying' to him by entering into his fairy tales. But if they stay in the mundane world, they can't relate to him at all.
The world of a child is a mysterious and magical place. The blooming of a rose in the garden is an enchanted event beyond all understanding; the weekly arrival of the great noisy garbage truck is anticipated with the fear that it might not happen and the joyous dread that it will. When my oldest daughter, nearly a year old, was brought out of her crib late at night to see the lights on our Christmas tree for the first time, she whispered, "Wow," an as-yet unknown richness in her tiny vocabulary. She said it a lot that first Christmas, as enchantments she'd never dreamed of appeared all around her.
We adults forget the fairy-tale lace that drapes childhood and screens it from so much of the ugliness in the world. It is our privilege at Christmas to attempt to add a little to the embroidery, with our Saint Nicholas and our hidden generosity. We're clumsy at it, no doubt. We're a little like the people in Don Quixote, pretending we see giants and ladies and noble squires instead of the mundane and everyday. But underneath it all, there's a stirring at our hearts, and I think it's then that I understand, a little, what Our Lord means when He says we have to be like little children to enter the kingdom of Heaven.