I’m an Adult, and I Believe in Santa Claus

It’s Christmas and for many people, faith comes into focus this time of the year. Christmas has been a secular thing for me for the past decade and a half. I was raised with specific religious beliefs, the sort of gift that didn’t keep on giving because it was what it was. There was no wonder, no mystery, no incentive for the awe one expects when considering the divine. It was believe this One Thing or else. No wonder I turned to nothing in my adult life.

But like Jonah, no matter how much I run away, what and who I am is always with me. Unlike how I was taught the story of Jonah – a fear-based warning that if you didn’t follow God’s will (which inevitably came to be defined by the church, rather than by God or the Bible), God would punish you in some heinous, sadistic way (seriously, what kind of God makes a leviathan eat you?) – my “coming back to God” moment didn’t involve a massive sea creature puking me up on the shore. In fact, it’s been quite wonderful.

Before I explain further, let me say that I haven’t come back to God. My thoughts on God have changed dramatically, so there’s nothing to come back to. But for the longest time, I simply said No. Not in an atheistic sort of way, but just no. I didn’t consider it. I didn’t entertain it. I simply ignored it because of the extent of the beliefs I’d inherited and their tangents upon tangents that I had to de-root and sort through. Now that that fearful and dirty work is over, I must rebuild.

I have to give credit to my son. Or at least to his existence. He is almost six years old now. Watching him grow up has given me opportunities I didn’t have as a child (Santa and Halloween) and opportunities to revisit some of my childhood things. It’s not that I was taught there was no Santa, it’s just that Santa wasn’t emphasized. I was raised in a literal interpretation of the Bible so in that perspective there’s not much room for imagination. What saddens me possibly the most is that: that my childhood was robbed of some of that imagination. Because belief is imagination.

I’m thirty-eight years old and I believe in Santa Claus.

I know Santa does not exist. I know there’s no magical lair at the North Pole. I know there’s no elves, flying reindeer, or an impossible mission on Christmas Eve to visit every child’s home. But I still believe.

I believe in the hope of Santa, that there’s some benevolent being out there who wants everyone to be happy. He wants everyone to be good, but not in a throw-you-in-hell kind of way. He threatens coal, but you’re not going to get coal. Humans need the carrot and the cudgel, but Santa is that right mix of expectation. The be-good-or-else idea that’s present in religion and Santa is an acknowledgement of man’s fallen state but also a belief in his higher state. I like to think that Santa checks his list, but only because he’s so happy to be able to give to so many deserving people. I believe in the spirit of Santa. I believe in that spirit that turns the world into a child’s wonderland every December. All that effort isn’t just for the kids. It’s adults filled with wonder and love. It’s everything that we’re good at and hope we can be. That’s Christmas. That’s Santa.

So what if I saw Jesus that way? What if I saw God that way?

I want to. I really do. But I can’t. That vision is just too clouded by what others have done with and in Jesus’s name.

I know I shouldn’t let what others do ruin what I like about something. But I learned one way early on, in my formative years. So what formed in me has turned to bone now. It’s there even if I wanted to tear it from my flesh. I think to myself that if I can enjoy Santa and the Christmas spirit despite the gross consumerism then why can’t I enjoy Jesus despite the literalists?

I know the answer to that question, but that answer isn’t the point. The point is wonder, imagination, and accepting that there’s great beauty in this world, even if there are flaws in the story and in those who tell it.

Meditation

Words are funny. Say the word “meditation” and you might picture a monk or a dedicated practitioner of an Eastern religion. You might picture robes and a serene background. You might hear “Ohmmmm.”

A lack of information often informs what we (think) we know about something. Stereotypes are the end product, but it takes time for a stereotype to build. Sometimes a word conjures a meaning or an image lined with meaning, and we lack the experience or sometimes even the words themselves to convey a new idea. It takes many people talking about something, naming it, describing it, doing it, to make an idea acceptable and accessible. Notice mental health in today’s world. People are more willing to talk about it (even athletes) and therefore people have the words and a structure in which they can talk about their own nebulous problems.

I was taught to pray. I was taught to pray to God the Father via Jesus. I was taught that I couldn’t talk to God if I had un-confessed sin in my heart. I was taught that God answered prayer, that answered prayer was a sign of one’s faithfulness, and that prayer was a duty. I was taught that formulaic prayers like the Our Father were wrong/legalistic; I was also taught so many other rules about prayer that despite the prayer’s content being up to the individual, there were still gates and dead ends and other obstacles to access the Almighty.

I used to pray. A lot. I would pray for an hour-and-a-half every night, reading through a list of everything I could think of. I thought it was my duty to pray for everyone I knew and everyone situation that I came across. The need was great, and so my effort needed to be greater.

All that prayer never got outside the ceiling. I don’t know or care if God ever heard. For me, it was conformity. I was doing what I was told to do. I brought no agency or will of my own to the situation. I did because I was afraid of the consequences of not. And so I stopped praying.

I miss prayer not like one misses a dead loved one but like the body misses food when it needs it. There’s something anemic about my life.

But I can’t pray. That ship has sailed. Prayer is sent out to God, and I don’t believe in God. I believe in something, but that’s another post. So what do I do?

Meditate.

I’m not interested in official meditation of any sort. Maybe somewhere down the road, but anything organized, even if it’s not religious per se, smacks of narrow-minded, blind obedience. Even if it’s not that in reality,  I perceive it like that.

And that’s what I like about the idea of meditation. It can be hijacked, but it doesn’t have to be. It can be simple. It can be one individual soul communing with itself, sending out tendrils and forays into the unknown. It can be just this, an opening to those things that nourish a soul. In my case, it’s opening to the possibility that nourishment exists.

This is an intro to an occasional series about the things I’m meditating on. Meditation for me is tied to writing. Writing for me is the easiest and most comfortable form of communication. But communication is the goal, and perhaps my writing/meditating can lead to improvement in other areas of communication.