Santa Doctrine

Another Christmas come and gone. I have to say, it's just not as much fun since the boys got older and Santa stopped dropping by.

I didn't grow up with Santa. None of my friends believed in Santa. Santa and the reindeer belonged to the wider secular society against which our Dutch immigrant Calvinist sub-culture defined itself. Plus, Mom always said that if she was going to do all the work of buying and wrapping presents, she was going to get the credit.

Thus, when I had kids and wanted them to grow up with the magic of Santa Claus, I didn't quite know how to do it. I mean, I understood the basics: hanging up stockings, leaving out cookies and milk, listening for hoofs on the roof after we said nighttime prayers. But, I asked a group of friends one night at a church buffet, what about the hard questions? What about when Owen asks why some kids get more and better gifts than other kids? My friends all laughed at me. "Kids don't think like that," they assured me. "They're really not interested in the finer doctrinal points of Santa theology."

Uh huh. So where were they, these laughing friends, when Owen at age 3 1/2 asked me why all poor children were bad? Surprised and disturbed, I assured him poor children were no worse than other children. He frowned.
"But we bought that truck for that poor boy." Yes, yes, we had. Every year our church received a list of names of children whose parents were in prison. We'd selected the name of a boy Owen's age, and together we'd chosen and wrapped a gift for him.
"You said he wouldn't have any presents so we needed to buy him one." Yes, but--
"You said we needed to think about the poor children who wouldn't have presents." Yes, that's--
"So the poor children must be bad 'cos Santa doesn't leave them presents."
Impeccable logic. Impossible questions.