During this narrative I will be answering the eternal question which is all pervading during the festive season namely does Santa Claus really exist?
Obviously the answer
we want is a resounding yes and so it will be.
Secondly I will be
exploding the popular myth that it was the Coca Cola Company who were
responsible for the red suited image of Santa.
St Nicholas is known by many different names around the world and he
undoubtedly a legend.
The legend began in the 4th century A.D. in what is now Demre in modern
Turkey.
Nicholas was a
Christian priest and was born in 280 A.D. in the Lycian city of Patara near the
ancient city of Myra where he later became Bishop.
Nicholas was the son
of a wealthy man and when he inherited his father’s wealth he traveled the land
helping the poor and sick and he was greatly admired for his piety and
kindness.
He became the subject
of many legends for example he was said
to have brought a dead child back to life and he once saved the life of a
prisoner by putting himself between the condemned man and his executioner also
he is said to have stopped a storm in order to save three sailors from
drowning.
But the most enduring and perhaps
the best known of the Nicholas legends was when he secretly left golden
dowries at the house of a poor man who was on the verge of selling his three
daughters into slavery or prostitution.
The dowries meant the
three poor sisters could be married.
This remarkable event
has led to a tradition we still celebrate to this day as the sisters had left there
stockings by the fire to dry and it was in the stocking where Nicholas placed
the gold.
Despite his many
secret late night visits to the homes of the poor and needy of the city he is
forever known as the gift giver of Myra.
In the year 303 A.D.,
Diocletian the Roman emperor commanded all citizens of the Roman Empire to
worship him as a god.
Nicholas and his
fellow Christians believed in but one god and in all conscience could not obey
the Emperor.
In his Anger
Diocletian threatened the Christians with imprisonment if they did not comply.
Many Christians
including Nicholas defied The Emperor and were imprisoned.
Nicholas was confined
to a small cell for almost ten years and suffered greatly but never wavered in
his beliefs.
It was In 313, when
Constantine replaced Diocletian to become the first Christian Emperor and
Constantine’s first act was the release of the Christians and upon his release
Nicholas returned to his post as Bishop of Myra where he continued his good
works until his death on December 6, 343.
On his death he was
sainted to become St Nicholas the patron saint of Children and sailors.
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