Is there a Santa Claus?

In time honored tradition and in keeping with my simplicity-theme this Advent season, I read the book Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa (illustrated by Joel Spector ~ hands down this is the best rendition out there) to my younger children after they had opened their book packs this morning.  Francis P. Church's response is worth reading and re-reading every year, adults and children alike.

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus

By Francis P. Church, first published in The New York Sun in 1897.

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:

Dear Editor—

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Virginia O’Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

*****

Go here to read about the letter exchange:   About the Exchange (click and scroll down)

Comments

[Tracy]

That is a wonderful tradition Cay. My oldest boys are at an age where they are on the edge of disbelief. We are doing a St. Nicholas unit using several ideas by Katherine in Tx. I wondered if the study on the saint would cause questions about Santa Claus, but none so far. I will remember this famous letter that somehow I had forgotten and refer to it when the inevitable questions begin. Perhaps we'll institue our own tradition of reading this book too.

[Cay in La.]

Tracey,
I could "see" the wheels spinning in my 9 yr old's mind as we read it. I also remember being very young the first time I read it and not understanding it to the full magnitude that I do today. But with the yearly tradition, it makes sense a little more each year and the trueness found in the letter is a reminder of what to believe in.

Spector's illustrations are effective, especially the one showing street people. He "shows" us the depths of despair and, sadly, reality, but he also "shows" us what heights the illusion of Santa and the reality of faith and the beauty of art can take us to.

He writes: "Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding."

Is Francis Church speaking here of God? I think so.

Do we believe in what is unseen and unproven? Do we believe in things that only faith, poetry, love, romance, art, and beauty can make us feel...even in the mist of a fallen, sinful world?

I think we must.