It’s an annual debate in congregations across the country. Now is your chance to officially ban Santa from the church. Simply take the poll.
You can also click here to leave a comment.
[polldaddy poll=4257584]
Editor’s Note: This is just for fun, Santa will not actually be excommunicated. Please play nice in the comment section.
I am a believer in Jesus Christ and a fan of Santa Clause. In fact, I think that what santa does is a good thing. I have never been confused and never thought that my parents lied. It was a fun story then and I sure do enjoy surprising my kids on Christmas morning when I get to play Santa. And some are even adults now, and they don’t seem angry about me not telling them that we bought and wrapped all of their presents and neither do they question wether or not Jesus is real. They are molding and developing their own faith and personal relationship with Christ.
I dont teach my kids of santa. I dont want them looking at me later and saying but mommy if santa 9, the tooth fairy, easter bunny and all those other characters 0 you told me about arent real how do we know Jesus is real. i dont want to build the doubt. We celebrate the holidays and big milestones we just leave the fictional characters out of it.
If we tell kids that there is Santa and we tell kids that there is God, when they find out we lied to them about Santa do they believe us about God?
I work mainly with unchurched kids. I have a policy to never mix fantasy with the reality of the Word of God so I leave Santa out of our Christmas time celebrations at our Kids’ Club. They don’t miss it and it works for us.
My children have this doubt who Santa is, until they seen me one
christmas night putting gifts on their christmas stockings.
From then on, they knew who is the real Santa, HOhoho….
Since Santa is such a “norm” in many families, to completely discount it would be pointless, and there are ways to “allow” Santa to be acknowledged, and accepted, w/out making it more important than the true reason we have Christmas. There are many stories, poems and figurines that portray Santa kneeling to the Baby Jesus, and Santa himself saying that the real reason we have Christmas is because of Jesus. As far as Santa visiting church, I personally would rather it not happen, but it could be incorporated in such a way that the children see that Santa worships Jesus also.
The Saint that became Santa Claus, St. Nick should continue to live in the hearts of everyone. The spirit of giving should never be taken away regardless of the misperceptions of the two.
If Santa comes to church at Christmastime, he should be bowing down to (baby) Jesus. : )
We don’t do Santa, but I’m not opposed. If your church as a large gathering, it can be fun to have Santa read a story or give a simple gift.
Personally, I have been very careful to not do Santa at church. I just don’t bring it up, but I also NEVER rearrange the letters to spells Satan. I don’t think the idea of Santa is all bad, but I don’t do Santa at church for three reasons.
One, out of respect for those who really do believe Santa equals Satan. Some people really have strong convictions against teaching Santa to kids and I don’t want to incite them to riot.
Two, anytime you bring up Santa you get the fifth grader that shouts, “Santa’s not real, it’s just your parents.” And then your stuck trying to figure out if you want to lie to the crying kindergartener in the front row at church!
Three, the kids are going to hear about Santa everywhere. I want to make sure at church I don’t water down the beauty of the real Christmas.
Leslie, if Santa ever did come to my church, I really like what you have done. What a great idea to have Santa tell the Christmas story!
We had a beautiful Santa and Ms. Claus visit our kids today. He did talk to the kids about the real meaning of christmas being the birth of Jesus… he explained how the true meaning influenced the actions of Santa… it found a nice balance. :)
I see santa like silly bandz. If you work with kids you know what they are. They are discracting, and keep the kids from focusing on the service. But they are not bad. They can actually be a great tool to help teach and build relationship. We even did a silly band party at our church and it went amazingly well.
So is Santa a distraction from the true meaning of Christmas. He can be sometime. But he can also be a great tool to building realationships with in you community and sharing the love of Jesus through giving!
I don’t do Santa with the kids at all. We just don’t talk about it. I don’t put up decorations with Santa on them. I don’t do crafts that are related to Santa… we just don’t do Santa. I’ve never been a fan actually, even as a kid. The focus is on Jesus and His Birthday.