Audio only:
Joe examines the debate over whether you should lie to your kids about Santa Claus.
Transcript:
Joe:
Welcome back to Shameless Popery. I’m Joe Heschmeyer, and today I want to tackle a controversial question even amongst Christians should parents lie to their kids about Santa Claus? My position is simple. If you want to tell them the true story of St. Nicholas, that’s great. If you and your kids want to play Santa, go for it. But lying is always wrong. You shouldn’t lie to anyone. You definitely shouldn’t lie to the kids. You are meant to be teaching right from wrong, and you most especially shouldn’t lie to honor the birth of Jesus Christ. Now, some of you are already disagreeing with this thinking, I’m pearl clutching or being legalistic. After all, it’s just Santa Claus, right? It’s harmless. It’s not really lying. And ironically, perhaps nobody has spent more time defending the pro lying side of the Santa Claus argument as Dennis Prager.
CLIP:
Every year, I can’t remember how many years already, many decades, I have devoted an hour of my radio show to making the case for people who celebrate Christmas to celebrate Santa Claus because I had heard and read Christians saying, or just Gentiles in general, non-Jews, oh, we don’t want to lie to our children. It’s not good to lie to your child.
Joe:
But here’s the thing, those Christian parents who say they shouldn’t lie to their kids are right. We shouldn’t lie to anyone. It’s Proverbs 1222 says, lying lips are an abomination to the Lord. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. Whereas the devil has nothing to do with the truth because there is no truth in him. For he is a liar and the father of lies, St. Paul tells us not to lie to anyone. Revelation 21 describes the lot of all liars as the second death, which means damnation. Now, Christians today often treat lying as kind of a trivial offense, but in the Bible it’s condemned in the strongest language. The catechism warns that lying is to be condemned by its very nature, meaning that it is always wrong to lie. It doesn’t matter why you’re lying. Lying is never the right answer. You were given the gift of speech to communicate the truth.
To use that gift to spread lies instead is a kind of perversion and it’s contrary to both justice and to charity. So if we shouldn’t lie to a stranger, how much more do we owe the truth to our own children, particularly when we’ve been entrusted the task of teaching them about Jesus Christ? Now I’m going to examine some more of the arguments for and against lying to your children about Santa. But first I want to take a moment to thank our patrons over@schmojoe.com. I’m incredibly grateful to all of you for keeping this channel going and growing. No lie, it’s been a great year for the channel and that wouldn’t have been possible without you. So thank you for all your prayers, your likes and your shares and the cash you can spare, and I promise not to try your rhyming for the rest of this episode. Liar. So even though Dennis Prager defends pretending that Santa’s real to your kids, he mentions an important phenomenon lying to your kids about Santa might end up turning them into atheists,
CLIP:
People who called my show up and they would say on occasion I was raised a Christian home and then my parents taught me about Christ and Jesus and then God and the Bible and Santa. And then when I learned Santa was not real, I thought, oh, maybe God’s not real too, which is a strange correlation.
Joe:
Obviously most people don’t go from Santa’s not real to God’s not real, but it’s also not as rare as you might think. And frankly, it’s not that strange of a correlation, particularly given that we’re talking about children here in the words of the Second Vatican Council, the Christian family is a sort of domestic church in which the parents serve by word and example as the first preachers of the faith to their children. If your kids grow up not knowing the gospel, you can’t just blame the school or the parish because that job first and foremost is your own. But what if you mix the truth about Jesus with weird lies about Santa? Remember, the catechism describes lying as the work of the devil. So what if you decide as the first preachers of the faith to intentionally mix the truth of Jesus Christ and the work of the devil?
It wouldn’t be shocking that your kids might have trouble separating the two and they might respond by rejecting your whole message. Now as an adult, the difference between Santa and God is obvious, but to a little kid, someone naive enough to believe in Santa in the first place, it’s not surprising if they’re not sophisticated enough to distinguish the two, particularly when they’re both presented in kind of the same way he sees you when you’re sleeping. He knows when you’re awake. He knows if you’ve been bad or good. So be good for goodness sake, I’m not the one rhyming here for the record, yes you are. So not only should you avoid lying entirely, you should be particularly mindful of avoiding lying when you’re talking to your kids about Jesus. It’s important for the good of their souls as well as your own. But Dennis Prager raises some important challenges to this idea and ones that I think are worth addressing head on. First, he argues that we’re not really lying. We’re just playing make believe.
CLIP:
Are you lying to your child if you make believe, make believe and lying are not the same thing. Here’s another question. Did you read to your kids’ fairytales? Did you read Pinocchio to your kid or Cinderella? Do you make sure to say, you know, these people never existed. There really isn’t a Pinocchio, there really isn’t a Cinderella. Why don’t you do that? Are you lying? You’re making believe that there was a Cinderella and there was a Pinocchio.
Joe:
Now prager’s right about one thing, lying and pretending are not the same. So what is the difference the catechism defines the lie is speaking of falsehood with the intention of deceiving, a definition coming from sin, Augustine. So those are the two ingredients of a lie. You’re saying something you know is false and you’re saying it because you intend the other person to believe the false thing is true. That’s why it’s not a lie to tell your kids a fairytale. It’s not a lie for an actor to perform in a play or for Jesus to tell a parable because in each of those cases, the things that you’re describing, they didn’t literally happen, but you’re not trying to deceive anybody into thinking that they did. And there’s a really simple test here. If your kid comes up to you and says, is this a true story or did this really happen? You’d obviously say no. If you told them yes, you’d be lying, but prager insists that if we’re going to be consistent on this, then we also can’t do things like teach kids that the tooth fairy is real.
CLIP:
So this notion you’re lying to your children if you tell them about Santa Claus is a strange notion. I’m curious, do none of these families have a tooth fairy? Do they tell their kids, oh, there’s no such thing as a tooth fairy.
Joe:
Is the tooth fairy not real? I don’t know that I ever asked about that one. Where do my teeth go? Who’s got my teeth? Hello? Darkness, smile, friend. But sure, okay, obviously pr we accept your terms. Don’t lie to your kids about the tooth fairy either. That one’s just less controversial. You don’t have a whole culture of people loudly insisting that we all must pretend like she is. In fact, tooth fairy Laura is so vague. I had to look up the fact that she is apparently considered by three quarters of Americans to be a female. So I think we can all agree to that. Let’s not lie about the tooth fairy either. I don’t think that’s going to be a big challenge. But here’s the thing. Unlike the tooth fairy, people are really resistant to tell kids the truth about Santa. And I think they’re motivated for a good reason. They’re afraid it’s going to spoil Christmas.
CLIP:
It’s beautiful to make religion fun for children. It shouldn’t only be fun. It has a very serious component, but it should be at least if you want your child to love it as well as intellectually appreciated.
Joe:
But the idea that kids need to believe Santa’s real in order to enjoy Christmas fundamentally misunderstands children from as young as 18 months. Infants understand the idea of pretend. They’ll do things like pretend to eat and drink. They’ll laugh when adult pantomime actions like that pretty soon after. They’re doing what’s called collaborative pretending, or what psychologists call joint pretense games, things like playing tea parties with you. And notice all of those things are perfectly enjoyable for the kids, even though they know that it’s just pretend a kid’s day is not going to be ruined when they learn. Peter Rabbit’s not based on a true story or there’s not really tea in your Tea Cup. Researchers interviewing kids from four to seven found not one of them thought, lying and pretend were the same, even if they sometimes had trouble distinguishing, for instance, whether white lies were lies or pretend, but in fairness to those kids, that’s frankly the same mistake Dennis Fragger makes when he insists that lying to your kids about Santa is the same thing as playing. Pretend so the choices here aren’t lie to your kids or refuse to have fun at Christmas. Kids can have a great time playing pretend with you. The question then becomes why that isn’t good enough for us? Why do we think it’s important to not just play pretend with our kits, but to actively lie to them about Santa? Now, I’d suggest this says more about us than it does about them. After all, there’s an entire genre of Christmas movies about cynical adults discovering that Santa is real. After all,
CLIP:
Is Santa Claus real? I don’t want a rob her of the fun of believing in Santa, but what if he is real? That Santa Claus is real? Yes, I believe in Santa Claus,
Joe:
But these movies are made for adults, not kids, and for good reason. Many of us have nostalgia for the Christmases of our childhood, but I think there’s an obvious reason for that, that has nothing to do with Santa Claus as a kid. Christmas was, I hope, a stress-free, joyful holiday that felt magical. We have memories of things like opening presence and spending time with the people we love the most in the world. And these moments are magical because there are all these people in our lives who love us enough to work really hard to make sure we have these amazing moments. But now that we’re adults, not only is nobody doing that for us anymore, it might actually be our turn to do that for other people. And so Christmas becomes a stressful time of year,
CLIP:
Although you hopefully don’t feel like you are the Grinch himself. You might relate a little bit because of the stress of the holidays. Oh my gosh, the cost of everything. People pulling on you from many different directions. We have the list of gifts to buy. We have the shipping to track, we have the meals to prepare. There’s a recent survey that I wanted to tell you about conducted by the A PA, the American Psychological Association. Nine and 10 Grownups say they feel significant stress during the holiday. They’ve got too much to do, they got to find the right gifts, they spend too much money, yada, yada.
Joe:
So I’d suggest the reason Christmas was more fun as a kid wasn’t because you thought Santa was real back then and now you don’t. It’s because you weren’t spending money. You can’t afford on gifts. You’re not sure your loved ones are going to like, or cleaning and hosting visitors or traveling and staying on somebody else’s couch or dealing with family members or in-laws or missing the loved ones you won’t be seeing
CLIP:
Look more presents. I’m going to need everybody to show me constantly how much fun you’re having, or I’ll be completely devastated. Time for our annual unhealthy holiday breakfast. Oh, yum. My body can’t handle junk food like this anymore. Same. I’m going to crash so hard in an hour
Joe:
Now. Now girls remember that if your mother doesn’t think you enjoyed every moment of this day, then I’ll be the only one left to console her when she cries later. What makes this worst is that the parents who’ve decided that they need to lie to their kids in order for them to enjoy Christmas, want the rest of us to join them in this lie. And look, I’m not going to go out of my way to tell your kid Santa’s not real, but don’t insist that other adults or worse other kids have to play along with something we know isn’t true. Will you stop at the ice cream store on the way home?
CLIP:
No, not today. It’s already way too late.
Joe:
Ready, please. I’ve been good all day.
CLIP:
I wish we could, but actually the ice cream store is closed today.
Joe:
What do you mean?
CLIP:
You didn’t know this? When it’s too cold outside all the ice cream stores close because the ice cream machines freeze up and they don’t work anymore.
Joe:
But here’s what I think is the heart of the issue.
CLIP:
It’s beautiful to make religion fun for children.
Joe:
Dennis Prager is right. It is beautiful to make religion fun for children. An advent is a perfect time for this. In my own family, we like the advent candles. We sing, oh, Emmanuel. We read special books. We set up the nativity scene without the baby Jesus present yet. And we help to kind of cultivate a spirit of joyful waiting in our little kids. But the church has rightly worn that this spirit of advent is threatened by the commercialization of Christmas and consumer superficiality. Don’t miss the 12 days of Toyotathon, but which side of the fight is Santa Claus on in this battle between Christmas and Toyotathon. But while Santa Claus comes from the Dutch name for St. Nicholas, the modern American figure of Santa Claus has basically nothing to do with the fort century bishop of Myra. Our whole mental image of Santa is shaped in no small part. By early 20th century advertising
CLIP:
By about 1900 Santa had developed into his current iconic style. It should be noted that contrary to popular belief, Coca-Cola didn’t change his colors to their corporate scheme, but instead used the conveniently red and white Santa in 1931 to help sell more soda during their off season. Though Coke didn’t create him, their omnipresent ads probably did brand this as the one true Santa in the minds of millions, helping spread him around the world to many cultures with no traditions of winter gift givers.
Joe:
Case in point, Santa now apparently lives at the North Pole, not Turkey. And instead of being a celibate bishop, he’s got a wife now whose name is Mrs. Claus. So apparently Claus is now his last name, and the message that he preaches isn’t one about the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. It’s a message about the importance of family and sharing, but most importantly of proving your love for others by buying more products.
CLIP:
The heart of a child is a wonderful thing worth more than all the presents in the world, but presents are good things. They symbolize our good feeling for each other. And I hope that among your presence you’ll find the things you’ll cherish from the ones you love to mother with, love to dad with love to junior with love to my best girl with love. Merry Christmas with love. You see, the present is merely the symbol. It is being together, being kind, respecting one’s friends and neighbors. That’s the true spirit of Christmas.
Joe:
So the risk here is that you’re not really making religion fun for children. Rather, in the name of fun, you’re taking the religion out of Christmas. You’re turning it from a religious feast day to some vague celebration of family or worse consumerism. The modern Santa is just a shabby substitute for the real sake Nicholas, and a much worse substitute for Jesus of Nazareth. So if you must keep Santa around, let your kids in on it, treat it as make belief and see for yourselves that they’re still going to enjoy it. There’s no need to lie, particularly to the children entrusted to your care and especially in something sacred. Instead, I’d argue we should be pushing to reclaim the true meaning of Christmas, which begins with reclaiming the true meaning of advent. Now, I actually talk about all that, including some aspects you might not know about in this video from last year right here. For Shameless Popery, I’m Joe, Heschmeyer. God bless you.