‘Tis the season for my grandsons to write their letters to Santa Claus. Aiden, age 11, is very likely past the belief-in-St.-Nick stage, but he’s hedging his bets by penning a wish list for one more year. There’s always the possibility that, if it really is Mom and Dad doing the gifting, the gravy train will end once the Jolly Old Guy is debunked. Can’t risk losing out on those Legos!
Once, when his dad—my son Sheridan—was Aiden’s age, I’d been Christmas shopping and arrived home with plenty of time before he was due back from middle school. Or so I thought. I’d forgotten about early dismissal that day, and as I walked in the front door, laden with holiday gifts, there he was on the sofa. The jig was up! At that point, secrecy was unnecessary, and I needed help getting everything upstairs before the younger kids got off the elementary school bus. As he toted packages, he admitted that he’d known the truth for a while.
Sheridan had aged out of the fantasy, and Aiden will surely soon follow suit. But in both cases, little siblings still fervently believe. The big brothers, tasked with keeping Santa alive for their siblings, retained the joy of Christmas by becoming Santa’s helpers themselves. That famously generous heart may not belong to an actual Mr. Claus—but they don’t seem to mind. As big kids, their own hearts grow more generous and loving. They become Little Santas.
What does this have to do with Jesus?
There are a great many people who do not believe in him, who would say that Christ, like Santa, is just a mythical figure. As Christians, we are called to have faith in a God who came to earth in the person of Jesus. A God who lives, loves and gives to us still. But there are moments when I ask myself, “Is this all wishful thinking?”
I was reassured by a lovely little book of Advent and Christmas meditations, Let Every Heart Prepare: Meditations for Advent and Christmas (Morehouse, 1998) by the Episcopal priest Barbara Cawthorne Crafton. In her Christmas Eve meditation, Crafton writes: “‘You just believe in this stuff because you want it to be true.’ People who don’t believe sometimes say that with an air of triumph, as if they’ve just discovered the fatal flaw that will bring down the whole religious enterprise. … But of COURSE we want it to be true. If we didn’t want it to be true, we’d believe in something else.”
This Advent and Christmas, let’s not allow our doubts to keep us from believing in the power of love.
Looking at the sorry state of the world, all the hatred and division, I sometimes do ask myself if I’m only hoping Jesus is true. If he really existed, wouldn’t Jesus be fixing this huge mess? Wouldn’t he have intervened to stop the suffering of children and take down cruel tyrants? Wouldn’t he reveal himself to us now, as he did to his disciples 2,000 years ago? And wouldn’t that solve all our problems?
But then I remember. I remember how precious few people believed in Jesus even when he walked the earth, even with the evidence before their own eyes. When they heard “Love thy neighbor” directly from him, did they take it to heart?
In 2025, many of us continue to disregard the clear call to care for one another—we behave exactly as most people did after seeing Jesus in the flesh. We too choose not to see God, even though evidence of God is all around us. Amid all this turmoil and sometimes at great personal risk, so many people show incredible kindness, truly loving their neighbor—and understanding that everyone is their neighbor. Where do that goodness and mercy and courage come from?
Crafton writes, “Something has happened that has made us want to order our lives according to his presence and not his absence. … Christ is born in us, and we are re-born into our own lives.”
If the simple message of the Santa Claus story is that we are loved and are called to share that love, then the deeper meaning is true. The meaning of Jesus’ story is the same and truer still. So this Advent and Christmas, let’s not allow our doubts to keep us from believing in the power of love. Let us welcome the holy child, the essence of love, into the world again. Let us hope and let us find our hope fulfilled.
Jesus is born. In us. Let us live in joyful response to this greatest gift of all.
