Santa Claus = St. Nicholas?
Enjoy this lovely image of St. Nicholas from artist Susan Seals, and purchase a print here . A friend of mine posted on a message board wondering what I've heard many Christians (Protestant and Catholic) wonder: how a person can encourage his or her children to believe in Santa Claus, as opposed to St. Nicholas, the Catholic saint. Are they really the same person? First, it must be pointed out that Santa Claus IS St. Nick, at least literally. Santa means "Saint" and "Claus" is an abbreviated form of Nicholas (as in Ni-KLAUS). In our house, Baby Jesus gives the gifts (and hence all requests for toys are addressed to him). We tell our kids the gifts come from Baby Jesus but St. Nicholas delivers them, and St. Nicholas lives in heaven, which is a lot nicer than the North Pole. We let them think what they want about reindeer and elves. With our own children, we don't really encourage them to watch movies that propose to explain the Saint as a secular phenomenon,