Nanci and Thomas Kuykendall

>> Just curious as to how everyone handles the Santa Claus thing?
>
>I have thought about this long and hard. I agree to some extent that it is a lie....

A Lie?? You mean there is no Santa??? (Sob) I do not want to live in a world without Santa. Santa to me represents the Spirit of Giving. When my children are too old to believe in the literal Santa anymore, I will be able to introduce them to the more complex concept of Santa as the part of everyone's heart that is full of charity and giving during the holiday season. It is the part of all of us that looks for magic in life everyday. The part of the spirit that allows us to have faith in things we cannot understand, and the part that finds a miracle in a rain shower, or an autumn tree in full blazing array, or a newborn babe, is the part where Santa lives.

I hope my children can help to play Santa for the needy, and for younger family members, and for each other, and for us. In our house, everyone gets a stocking. Nobody is too old for magic, and love, and hope. I still think that Francis P. Church said it so very well over a hundred years ago. For those of you who have not read it, please do. It is a very special piece of jounalism. For those of you who have, enjoy it again, and get in the spirit of giving for the season.

Nanci K.

Francis P. Church's editorial, "Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus" was an immediate sensation, and went on to became one of the most famous editorials ever written. It first appeared in the The New York Sun in 1897, almost a hundred years ago, and was reprinted annually until 1949 when the paper went out of business.

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.





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