Saint Nicholas Day

Saint Nicholas digital artwork by Diane Newcomer

Episode Notes:

Diane and Russ kick off the episode discussing the history of St. Nicholas, his real-life, and the connections to Santa Claus.

Stories of St. Nicholas's generosity, including the tale of the three sisters and the origins of Christmas stockings, are highlighted.

The significance of bishop attire resembling Santa's red hat and its symbolic connection are explored.

An intriguing riddle about travel without leaving a corner sparks a playful conversation.

Russ and Diane share lighthearted jokes related to snowmen and the holiday spirit.

A recommended resource, the Veggie Tales St. Nicholas special, is suggested for further learning.

The episode concludes with a Bible verse shared by John.

For those interested in learning more about deeper story of St. Nicholas, we highly recommend the Veggie Tales St. Nicholas Special. It's a wonderful resource that provides insights into the historical figure and traditions associated with St. Nicholas Day.

Our recommendations are for informational purposes. We are not officially affiliated with or endorsed by the creators or distributors of these resources.

Veggie Tales: Saint Nicholas: A Story of Joyful Giving

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Sacred Seasons: A Family Guide to Center Your Year Around Jesus

Transcript:

Diane: Hello and welcome to I Believe In a podcast for spiritual formation for kids and families. I'm Diane.

Russ: and I'm Russ. Welcome to this week's episode.

Diane: You know what I woke up to this morning?

Russ: What?

Diane: Snow!

Russ: That’s right. It snowed here in the Midwest and the start of snow. The first snow is usually right around the start of the Advent season.

Diane: Yeah, Advent's coming up too. When does it start?

Russ: It’s four Sundays before December 25th, so it's going to start on December 3rd this year, and this episode, we're going to focus on St. Nicholas Day.

Diane: That’s a good one.

Russ: It is. St. Nicholas Day is on December the 6th. So, it is three weeks? No, a little before, three weeks before Christmas.

Diane: Well, Christmas is on December 25th.

Russ: Right.

Diane:  So you could just go by days instead of weeks if you wanted to.

Russ: Yes, it's 19 days before.

Diane: There you go.

Russ: Yeah.

Diane: Okay, so do you know that there are other names for St. Nicholas?

Russ: Yes, I did because St. Nicholas is in English and some places like I think it's in the Netherlands that he is called Sinterklass.

Diane: Well, what does that sound like?

Russ: Sinterklass

Diane:  Saaaanta Clause . It sounds like St. Nicholas.

Russ: Yeah.

Diane: So, Saint Nicholas was a real person who was the bishop of Myra in what is now known as Turkey. I've been to Turkey. I like Turkey a lot. The country.

Russ: Yes.

Diane: I clearly couldn't have been to the food. But Thanksgiving's on my mind because we just had Turkey for Thanksgiving. So St. Nicholas was also called Nicholas the Wonder Worker. He's known for his many miracles, as well as for being the inspiration for the popular figure of Santa Claus.

Russ: Yeah, so he lived in the late 200s and early 300s. He was a monk who then later got appointed to be the, like you said, the Bishop of Myra. Some people even say, that he was at the Council of Nicaea, which is really important in the early church.

Diane: The Nicene Creed?

Russ: Yes, it's a little disputed if he was there or not, but he's on some of the lists of attendees.

Diane: He could have been.

Russ: He could have been.

Diane: Okay. Did you know that when, St. Nicholas, was a young man his parents passed away and he inherited a big fortune and he started giving it away.

Russ: Yeah he was very generous or he's known for generosity which is giving things away and so one of the legends about St. Nicholas and him giving things away is there were three sisters in I think in myra and um he overheard them lamenting or being sad that they didn't have enough money to get married, and so then at night he went back to their house and he took some of his gold and he put gold pieces in their socks that were hanging up near the fire to be dried overnight, and so when they woke up in the morning, they had money in their socks and they were able to get married, and that is kind of the start of why we have Christmas stockings nowadays.

Diane: Now, I put up some big decorative stockings that have been passed down to me. My grandma actually made them.  They’re quilted and you got given one as well.

Russ: Yeah

Diane: and but I would not wear those on my feet.

Russ: Yeah, but back then, clothes were really, really hard to make and really expensive, and one of those pair of stockings would have cost like, if you were buying it today would have cost like $500 or a $1000 dollars.

Diane: For some socks.

Russ: Socks, yeah.

Diane: Well, I guess it's important to have warm feet.

Russ: Yeah, especially in the winter. So these would have probably been the only socks that they owned and so they probably didn't wash them very often, but they'd get wet and they'd be, because they wear them outside when it was cold. So they'd be wet and they'd put them near the fire overnight to dry because there's nothing worse than putting on wet socks in the morning cold wet socks

Diane: The stockings were hung by the chimney with care.

Russ: That’s right. You had to hang them carefully so they didn't fall in the fire.

Diane: Oh, that would be bad. That would be very bad.

Diane: That would be very expensive.

Russ: That would be very expensive if your $500 socks got burned.

Diane: Yes. My kids, however, don't seem to care about losing socks.

Russ: That’s true.

Diane: We lose lots of socks in our house and they don't like to have them matching which drives me a little bonkers.

Russ: yes.

Diane: I have a riddle from the riddles desk.

Russ:Alright, let's hear it.

Diane: Okay, I can travel all around the world just like Santa Claus without ever leaving my corner. What am I?

Russ: You’re something that doesn't have a corner. Are you, uh, that's an asteroid orbiting the Earth?

Diane: No.

Russ: Oh.

Diane: We’re going to  have to come back to this one. That is my riddle . But now I have a joke. We're on to the joke's test.

Russ: Okay.

Diane: What do you call a snowman with a six pack?

Russ: Snowman don't have legs so it doesn't matter what you call them. You can't come anyway.

Diane: An ab domino snowman.

Russ: Oh!

Diane: Come on now. That was funny. That was a good one.

Russ: That was a good one.

Diane: You can catch me easily, especially during the holidays, but you can never throw me. What am I?

Russ: I can catch you, but never throw you. Ummm a cold?

Diane: Oh, you got it.

Russ: I got it.

Diane: Way to go. Okay. Here's... my last… it's a riddle.  Its a riddle/ joke.

Russ: okay.  It’s a “Roke”

Diane: No. What do you call Santa when he's broke and has no money

Russ: Santa jobs

Diane: Saint Nickel-less

Russ: St. Nickel-less

Diane: yeah ‘cause he’s less nickels. Come on those are good.

Russ: That was a joke.

Diane: So St. Nicholas is known for giving and I think also we can agree that Santa Claus is known for giving. So the whole theme there is giving. Now do you know what I thought was so interesting? I think I learned this on the Veggie Tales, St. Nicholas Special.

RussL Yes, which is a very good special to learn more about St. Nicholas.

Diane: Yes, if you want to continue on learning about St. Nicholas, this is our recommended resources is the Veggie Tales St. Nicholas special. They have a couple of them, but they have one on St. Nicholas.

Russ: Yes.

Diane: Okay. Now, bishops wear red hats that look like Santa Clauses’ hats. I never put that together.

Russ: Oh, okay, that makes sense.

Diane: So if you look up a picture of a bishop in the Catholic Church, they wear red hats.

Russ: Oh, so that would be why St. Nicholas is always wearing a red stocking cap.

Diane: Yeah, but his is more floppy. The bishop's caps are really straight. Yeah. But his, and that's why he's dressed in red.  Isn’t that interesting?

Russ:  That is interesting. I didn't know that.

Diane: Fun fact.

Russ: Yeah. Well kids, I hope that you've learned some about St. Nicholas Day on December 6th.

Diane: Some people, did you know some people put their shoes out by the door and they're filled with treats the next day?

Russ: Wow.

Diane: For celebrating St. Nicholas Day.

Russ: That would be, that would be impressive.

Diane: Yeah. Okay, thank you for joining us on another episode of

Together: ”I Believe In."

Diane: No, wait! We didn't answer the riddle! We can't leave them!

Russ: Oh, that's right. We didn't answer the riddle. Is it a ball?

Diane: No.

Russ: What is it?

Diane: It’s a stamp.

Russ: Oh, in your corner. Okay.

Diane: Yep, it can travel around the world and never leave its corner,

Together: okay, bye

John: Hi, I'm John and I'm gonna say a Bible verse. The Bible verses John 3: 16 for God so loved the world that he would give his only begotten son that whoever shall believe in him shall not parish but have eternal life.