Our beliefs guide us that Christmas & Santa Claus are as alike as two peas in a pod. But, really these are two different notions, one meshed into another until the myth is as distorted as any other myth in the world.
Christmas, the word when broken makes Christ’s mass. Christ derived Kristos, a translation of the Hebrew word ‘Messiah’ And the latter part derived from 'Missa' which means celebrating Euchrist; the breaking of bread and drinking wine while Jesus’s instruction at 'The Last Supper'. The issue of this eve, i.e. celebrating the birth of Jesus is very debatable. Supposedly, the date falls somewhere between a gap of 5 years. Well, they didn't have Facebook Timeline back then for obvious reasons.
Santa Claus as we now know was conceived by the Brits and Americans in the 19th century.The image maintained and reinforced by popular culture and bedtime stories. The main inspiration being Saint Nicholas who gave gifts to the poor and in one case presenting dowries for the three daughters of a godly Christian. Along with Sinterklass/Odin, this was merged with Father Christmas to form the modern day Santa Claus. In the mid 1800s,he began to acquire objects such as Reindeers, Bells & Sleighs.
Saint Nicholas
Our jolly old Saint Nicholas reflects our culture to a T, for he is fanciful, exuberant, bountiful, over-weight, and highly commercial. He also mirrors some of our highest ideals: childhood purity and innocence, selfless giving, unfaltering love, justice, and mercy. The problem is that, in the process, he has become burdened with some of society's greatest challenges: materialism, corporate greed, and domination by the media. Here, Santa carries more in his baggage than toys alone!
-Carol Jean-Swanson
Till the age of 16, I lived in an industrial town in the lower Himalayas. For things to get commercialized, the world had to move 20 miles south for me. So no one could really sell me ideas of make-believe, even if at an early age i was eager to buy. Well, no one except Television; that was the omnipresent, omniscient & omnipotent motherfucking lord of all men. If it told you Jesus was born on 25th December. You believe. If it said God, for whom all men are equal divided the children in Naughty & Nice. You ate that up, and start behaving. If it said you be good, and you get that Video Game Console on which you can play Contra, Mario, YOU.WILL.WAIT for it to drop down the chimney or the ventilator.
And that shenanigan would have sucked me down as well, if it wasn’t for my uninterested parents. I mean as if our own religious holidays weren’t enough now I was asking for gifts on Christmas and yes, the gifts had to be really good too. It was almost an international event and I wanted to be a part of it. They went along once as far as I remember. This pine tree lookalike outside our house. I brought in stuff to decorate it.Got a red sock and all, hung it over an open window. Looked up in the morning, and, nothing. All that faith in an Old fat cheerful white bearded man and it added up to absolutely nothing in return. People can be brutal when they think something should not bother you because of their assumptions that YOU don’t believe only because they don’t. I knew the truth about Santa. There was no Santa. But all this fuss had to be about something. Ramblings of 12yr old. Hoping against Hope. White Long Beard; Old; Fat; Rides a Reindeer; Ever happy, why not just go ahead and add smells of Booze & Felon to the description as well.
Comes down a Chimney. Rofl.
I took it pretty hard and you can call it bitterness but i will not succumb. It’s just good marketing. I am pretty sure not so long ago it would have been just a simple holiday when families gathered and you helped a cause. When you realised that miracles do happen and stories like Christmas Carol made you realise life is about living large not long. But that don’t sell no shit, Bro. So HALLMARK just went ahead & sodomized it.
It's A Wonderful Life
