Above: Me on "Santa's" lap in 1974!
Last Sunday, at my job, I committed a major faux-pas! I work part-time at a large church as a coordinator for pre-k and Kindergarten Sunday school classes. We have around 160 children (two hours with approximately 80 children each) in this age group on the average Sunday. During the course of Sunday school the children come to the big group room where I lead them in songs, a bible verse and introduce our lesson. Now, let me set the scene for today’s event. Our stage is outfitted with a set that resemble a backyard clubhouse complete with a picket fence, a tree where our friend Scout the squirrel lives and a galvanized pail on a pulley that brings us “pail mail.” The mail concept is not a new one in children’s programming – think of Blue’s Clues or Pee Wee’s playhouse. We have a bell that rings to alert us when we have mail. The only difference is our “pail mail” can retrieve letters from characters in the Bible. We just finished a series about Paul where we received postcards from him on his missionary journeys in the New Testament. Today I informed the children that we were not going to receive a postcard from Paul but, instead we were starting a new lesson series titled “Getting Ready for Christmas” and we would get a letter from another person in the Bible. (Bell rings!) As I go to retrieve our pail mail and return to my folding camp chair to read said letter a few little voices from the audience began to call out their guesses as to who may be the author of our letter. More then one voice yelled out “Santa Clause” and I heard another person chime in “the pilgrims” (it is Thanksgiving this week after all.) As I settle into my chair to read the letter which, in fact, is from a thankful, Samaritan afflicted with leprosy who Jesus healed, I hear yet one more unscripted audience member yell out that it is from Santa Claus. Do you see where this is going? I said the unthinkable to a large group of 4 and 5 year olds! “Santa is not real!” A few Gasps of horror and some blank stares alerted me of my mistake. “What I mean is Santa was not really in the Bible! The pilgrims lived a long time ago too but they were not in the Bible either. Our “pail mail” brings us letters from the Bible times!” I look around and access the situation. There are no tears so I move on rather quickly to the Samaritan’s compelling letter. Now for the apology. If your child was in the audience on this fateful Sunday or if you were a child in the audience that blissfully believed in the man in the red suit then I am very sorry! I am a mother of three small children ages 2, 4 and 6. My four-year-old was in the audience too! I actually responded in the casual way I would have replied to my own children. My husband and I have always told our children the Santa is mommy and daddy and the stories are fun but they are pretend. This seemed like a natural way to raise our children because it is how I was raised. My parents wanted to be completely honest with my brother and me. They were afraid of negative repercussions if we felt they had lied to us when we discovered the truth. This full disclosure carried over to the tooth fairy and the Easter bunny too! Contrary to what many may think I did not feel like I lost out by missing the whole Santa thing. At the same time, I do not want to spoil the fun for anyone else. When I tell my children about Santa I always tell them that children and their parents like to pretend that Santa is real and we do not want to spoil the surprise. I do not want them to be the know-it-all that reveals the big secret to all their classmates. Little did I know that I would be the know-it-all that crushed the Christmas Eve dreams of some 60 children. (We had low attendance this week due to the Thanksgiving holiday!) This incident reminds me of the recent political elections. Candidates on both sides were often quoted as making some shocking statement or other but when you read into it further you realized they misspoke, had a foot-in-mouth moment or were misquoted. I could just see an advertisement with my face and the announcer proclaiming, “she crushed the dreams of dozens of unsuspecting children by telling them Santa is not real!” Hopefully, In the context of the “whole story” my audience and their parents may recognize that I did have one such “foot-in-mouth” moment and I did not intentionally mean to be a grinch! Who knows, they may even find the situation funny some day. In the mean time, I am sorry and Merry Christmas!
