We were on out way to shop for YaYa’s Christmas gifts for the family. The new set of questions began firing from YaYa’s inquisitive mind.
“Mom, did you know that Jesus’ Birthday is on Christmas?!”
The conversation went from Jesus’ Birthday to gift giving. I fired back questions to see what his view might be.
I asked him, “Why do you think that people exchange gifts on Jesus’ Birthday?” YaYa didn’t know exactly and I admitted that neither did I. He thought about it for a few minutes and it was decided that the gift giving was a way to celebrate Jesus’ Birthday (since he was not physically present to receive gifts). We were both satisfied with this idea.
“And Santa? How does he fit in?” I probed.
That was the easy one. YaYa said that Santa rewards people for being good, just like Jesus wants us to be good people. Of course his theory didn’t stop there. It was an interesting view, which I suspect might be slightly influenced by the Tim Allen movie, The Santa Clause. According to YaYa, someone “decides” that they want to be Santa and they have the job for a while. Then someone else takes on the job.