We do mainly focus on celebrating Christ's birth and on the nativity story. We have a great book called The Story of Christmas that tells the nativity story and says we give gifts at Christmas to remember the gift of Jesus and to show others our love as God showed us His love.
But Abby Jane does also know all about Santa, and I believe we are making a bit of a mid-season adjustment of our storyline on Santa. We have been tying him into Christ, to showing love, to remembering Christ's birth, but we have been treating the Santa she met at the Depot, etc. as the real deal. I believe we are going to shift towards talking about who St. Nicholas was back in the day, that the guys we see as Santa now are remembering the spirit of what St. Nick was about, etc. etc. We'll put out our cookies, oats for reindeer, etc., the whole nine yards, but focus on how that's part of the Christmas tradition in remembering St. Nick, who gave to those in need out of the joy he had in Christ...
As we have been trying to figure out exactly how we want to handle this season, this article on a friend's has been very helpful!
Do you have a fabulous way you've handled it?
For what it's worth, if you're going hard core "Santa is real", feel no judgement here! I asked Jake last night if we've totally screwed up already, and he pointed out that we both totally believed and most people we know did as well, and it did not affect our spiritual lives... so if you've chosen that route, do NOT feel any guilt from this corner!
5 comments:
we JUST talked about this in Sun school yesterday! it left me wondering how i really felt now that Kirkley is discerning more and more....thanks for this article!
Of course I'm old school, but I like what the article said about developing that imagination to later be used as an act of holy worship. There are too many disappointments in this world to take away at this young age the tangible excitement of someone they don't really know that loves them unconditionally and brings them unexpectedly good gifts over and above what they can imagine. Not only crayons... but a kitchen! I think it is absolutely preparation for the day when they recognize the holiest and best gift of all, the gift of salvation and the giver of that gift who also loves them unconditionally and has personally paid the price for that wonderful, more than they can imagine, gift.
Emily, HI! Just wanted to say we have opted out of Santa as being "real" also. He is just something fun we pretend. I have felt guilty on numerous occasions. But Ellie was really pinning me down about certain things. And I just wanted the focus to be on Christ and His birth. It's been hard this year, because adults of course, will ask her about Santa, and tell her things such as, "if you believe" he will come. So the other day she asked, "We believe in Santa, like we believe in Jesus?" When she said that I didn't feel nearly as guilty about saying, no, Santa is pretend. Jesus is very real. Hope it goes well. It's been a tricky thing for us!
Next year we're going to start celebrating St. Nick day on Dec. 6th. It celebrates the real patron St. Nicholas by putting little toys in shoes. That way we can focus on the real saint who did wonderful things for children, and somehow tie in Santa Claus. Not sure how we're going to proceed from there, but I figure it will work itself out somehow. Right?
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