Both brought joys, with Jesus ushering a joy to a world of repentant sinners awaiting freedom from slavery to sin; and Santa Claus, the simplicity and purity of children’s joys.

There are two prominent figures during the Christmas season, those of the new born baby Jesus in a manger and the jolly bearded red vested old guy named Santa Claus.

Of course, I believe in Jesus Christ, born as an infant in the Tower of the Flock, the birthing place of female sheeps around the area of Bethlehem. Sheeps are delicately sensitive when giving birth to their offsprings and have to be delivered in a special nursery.

Since inns in Bethlehem were fully booked because of the census called by Augustus Caesar, Joseph’s relatives settled them in that place, sharing the birthing space with the ewes and lambs.

The shepherds in the area, totally surprised to hear the cry of a new born infant instead of the cries of a new born lamb, jumped to their feet and headed towards the tower to see this weird occurrence.

It was then that they beheld the “King and Shepherd” in a manger amidst the angelic shout outs of “Glory to God in the Highest!”

It was St. Francis of Assisi who first staged the nativity scene, popularly known as the “Belen” in 1223. The lovable saint asked the permission of Pope Honorius III to set up a manger with hay and two live animals — an ox and an ass — in a cave in the Italian village called Grecio. And on Christmas eve, he preached the “Baby of Bethlehem” to devotees.

It was some sort of trending or commercial success among Europeans that all churches have obligated themselves to put up a similitude of a nativity scene next to their altars, as we have them until today.

On the other hand, Santa Claus is not a mythical or legendary figure during Christmas time. He once was a real person. He is St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra in the 4th century who gathered the prestige of being a generous giver of gifts especially to poor children in his diocese.

He was known to have granted dowries to three daughters of an impoverished mother to save them from prostitution.

His remains were venerated in Myra until it was lost in translation from one site to another as Christians escaped the wrath of Muslim invaders who pillaged and desecrated Christian churches, relics, icons and symbols.

His costume depicts his episcopal status, while the color red of his robes stand for love and cheerful passion.

Eventually, the western world turned Santa Claus into a mythical or legendary figure of Christmas as the cheerful guy who rides a sled pulled by reindeers, slides down chimneys and encroaches on the privacy of homes in the dead of the night to fill the red socks hanging on Christmas trees.

The world reinvented St. Nicholas to suit the Christmas joy of giving, especially to children.

Incidentally, there was a priest who, tired of the people’s focus on consumerism brought about by Santa’s Christmas craze, ranted in his homily that parents should start demythologizing Santa Claus and advice their children not to believe in this mythical character since it derails the focus on the real theological axiology of the incarnation of God in a humble manger.

He made a lot of kids cry and parents angry! What the priest should have done is make Santa closer to the infant Jesus. Anyway, both shared a lot.

Jesus gave away gifts of love, hope and peace.

Both brought joys, with Jesus ushering a joy to a world of repentant sinners awaiting freedom from slavery to sin; and Santa Claus, the simplicity and purity of children’s joys, a joy that is so enviable for a complicatedly stressful world of adults.