Explaining Santa

I'm not Jewish, so I can't help you with the holiday connection. However, we don't so Santa, so I do have experience there. With mine, I told them an age appropriate explanation of where the myth started & explained that some people still like to pretend that santa comes to their house, etc. Then I explained our traditions & the fact that they get gifts from family members & why, etc. They've never really been confused by it. They just accept that families are all different & santa isn't part of our tradition.

My youngest is also 2.5. Her peers are about 1/2 Jewish, 1/2 not. I've never seen or heard them talk about Santa and I think at that age they usually don't. My 5 year old just started talking about Santa and we told her that she must not ever tell her friends at school, but Santa is not real. But Christian parents like to pretend that he is. And we made her promise not to tell as this is a secret among grown-ups.

My husband is ethnically Jewish. Our family does not subscribe to any religion. But we celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas for tradition, family time, and fun. We like to do "Santa things" like get a photo with Santa and write a letter to Santa. We tell our son that Santa is "just pretend" and that it's all a fun game, not real. I've also made a big deal of telling him that presents are NOT related to how good or bad he is, but that presents are just nice things people do for one another. I do not want him thinking in terms of being naughty or nice (instead I want him thinking in terms of behaviors being kind or rude). And I do not want him growing up thinking that poor people deserve their poverty due to naughtiness. So I try to stress the idea that our wealth and his privilege is mostly just good luck. In regards to some of the other comments, I would be careful about assigning Santa to Christians. In American culture, Santa is fairly secular.

I would actually disagree pretty strongly with this. Santa is part of Christmas, which is a Christian holiday. Yes, there are people who are not religious who celebrate Christmas, but people who are from non-Christian religions generally do not, because it is at its heart a celebration of a religion that is not ours.

Have you heard this recent controversy over Santa's skin color? The controversy stems from a growing cultural divide between people who claim Santa as a religious icon (they say Santa is a symbol of Saint Nicholas and thus Santa must have a light skin tone) and people who claim Santa as a more secular cultural symbol (they say Santa is an "idea" and can be any race or even a penguin). links to news articles: [url=http://www.slate.com/articles/life/holidays/2013/12/santa_claus_an_old_white_man_not_anymore_meet_santa_the_penguin_a_new_christmas.html]Santa Claus an old white man? Not anymore. Meet Santa the Penguin, a new Christmas symbol.[/url][url=http://www.thenation.com/blog/177637/santa-claus-and-white-racial-panic]Santa Claus and White Racial Panic | The Nation[/url][url=http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/letter-santa-claus-racial-lightning-rod]A letter to Santa Claus, racial lightning rod | MSNBC[/url]You can choose to represent Santa however you want to your child but the fact remains that a huge percentage of people who do anything Santa-related are NOT Christian. You're kid is going to wrongly and offensively assume that many atheists, agnostics, nonreligious "spiritual" people and even some Jewish people are Christian if you teach him/her that Santa is a Christian symbol. It's one thing to say "Santa's not a Jewish symbol" if you want to do that but it's quite another to make claims about other people and their religion (or lack thereof) based on their appreciation of Santa.

Mrs Ruth, if you see this, do not deny your kids Santa because of some religious association by you. Even if it were religious, you are depriving the kids of good hearted fun. Tell them what Santa if they want to celebrate the jolly old guy that brings presents to kids and grown-ups every 25th of December and that they decide. Many non-Jewish kids would celebrate Hannukah and some possibly convert if they knew of the fun aspects of Hannukah and Passover.