December 20, 2020 - "Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus"

We have experienced many disappointments during this time of pandemic.  One of them was that Saint Nicholas had to cancel his customary visit to our parish on the Sunday, December 6, the Second Sunday of Advent and his actual feast day.  Perhaps because Saint Nicholas (known by some by the nickname Santa Claus) had to cancel his travel plans this year, some of the children of the parish might be asking the question that Virginia O’Hanlon asked the editor of a New York newspaper many years ago.  In anticipation of Christmas, which we will celebrate on this coming Friday, I want to print what is probably the most reprinted editorial in any newspaper in the English language.  In 1897, the New York Sun received a letter to the Editor from Virginia O’Hanlon, who was eight years old and a resident of New York City.  Her letter was only a four sentences long:
 
Dear Editor:
I am eight years old.  Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.  Papa says:  “If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.  Please tell me the truth:  is there a Santa Claus?  Virginia O’Hanlon.  115 West Ninety-Fifth Street.
 
Francis Pharcellus Church was the editor of THE SUN who was assigned to answer little Virginia’s letter.  Church had served as a war correspondent during the American Civil War, a time that saw a great deal of suffering and lack of hope and faith in much of society.  He saw in Virginia’s letter (for which she may have had some help in composition from her father, Dr. Philip O’Hanlon) an opportunity to address this.  Let’s enjoy reading this wonderful piece as we wait for Christmas day.
 
Virginia, your little friends are wrong.  They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age.  They do not believe except they see.  They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds.  All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little.  In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole truth and knowledge.
 
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.  He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exists, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy.  Alas! How dreary would the world be if there were no Santa Claus.  It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias.  There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.  We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and delight.  The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
 
Not believe in Santa Claus!  You might as well not believe in fairies!  You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to watch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove?  Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign there is no Santa Claus.  The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see.  Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn?  Of course not, but that’s not proof that they are not there.  Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders that are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart.  Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond.  Is it all read?  Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
 
No Santa Claus!  Thank GOD!  He lives and he lives forever.  A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
 
Merry Christmas to all!
 
Until next week,
Fr. John Dillon