Who is Santa Claus, and how did he become part of our Christmas celebration?

by Rusty Tardo
. Some would have us to believe that America’s jolly Santa Claus was once Saint Nicholas, a kindly old saint who generously gave gifts to the needy. The facts of history however, are unconvincing. Actually there is no valid evidence that any “St. Nick” ever existed (in spite of Roman Catholic tradition), and Saint Nicholas was one of numerous Catholic “saints” who lost their status back in 1969 when Pope Paul VI revised the canon of saints and determined that some of the names had only ever been alive as legends or not enough was known about them to determine their status.
. But the older customs and traditions from which Santa Claus actually evolved, trace him back to Odin or Saturn – the sun-god himself! Santa has been called by many names in different countries down through the centuries, but the customs that surround him have remained steadfastly the same.
He has always been “an old, old, very old gray-bearded gentleman, and this is as it should be for his age is immense. Once he was Odin … But when Christianity drove away the old gods, he remained, and appeared again as St. Nicholas.” He “is always someone mysterious and shadowy, outside the run of ordinary human experience. His home is far away in Heaven or at the North Pole or in some remote country from which he comes on horseback, or in a sleigh drawn by reindeer. He may come secretly by night, or openly in the winter daylight, accompanied by a train of masked demons and strange animal forms. Often he is associated with fire, entering the house by the chimney, or leaving gifts by the hearth” (remember, he’s a sun-god), and “like the ancient gods from whom he is descended, he can read the heart and knows the hidden thoughts and actions of those he visits” ( Christina Hole, Christmas and Its Customs).
Undeniably, Santa Claus is a “god” of some sort, for he has attributes of deity. He can visit every house on earth in one night (omnipresence); he knows everything about every child’s behavior (omniscience); he rewards the good and punishes the bad, just like God! Even Christian parents have suggested to their own children that Santa is god, by saying things like, “You’d better be good because Santa is watching you,” or “Let’s go and tell Santa what you want for Christmas.” etc.
I wonder if Christian parents actually consider what they are doing when they teach their children to reverence and petition Santa instead of God!
As Christina Hole asked in her book,Christmas and its Customs, “Can it be that we are back again with Odin, the ancient gift-bringer, still going invisibly about at yuletide, as in past centuries, through the lands where he was once supreme?”
And Santa isn’t really as nice as he’d have you believe. Supposedly he rewards the good children, but the naughty children are passed over or given paltry gifts and trinkets. The facts however, tell a different story. Those facts are that Santa rewards the rich kids, no matter how spoiled, bratty and disrespectful they are. They’re rich, so Santa gives them all the best toys, the latest electronic games, i-phones, etc. And the poor kids? They get some Dollar Store toys, no matter how good they are.
Santa is partial. Santa is a respecter of persons. Santa is an evil fraud.
Ancient backslidden Israel adopted the abominable Cannanite religious practice of sacrificing their children to Moloch, often depicted as a huge bronze idol whose fat swollen belly was an oven, and whose arms were extended making a “lap” or an “altar”, to which parents brought their children, and laid them on that lap to be roasted alive! As an act of devotion to their false god, they sacrificed their own children. In the ancient custom, the children themselves were the presents the parents gave to “Santa.” That gives a whole new significance to the act of bringing your children to Santa, and sitting them on his lap, doesn’t it?