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    The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas
    The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas
    The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas
    Ebook101 pages1 hour

    The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas

    By William J. Bennett

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    About this ebook

    Former secretary of education and New York Times bestselling author William Bennett blends his historical expertise with his gift for storytelling into a heartwarming book about the man who ultimately became known as Santa Claus.

    Beloved writer and speaker William Bennett brings the legendary Saint Nicholas to life in this fascinating and faith-affirming book that will change the way you think about Santa Claus and the meaning of Christmas. Bennett reflects on Saint Nicholas’s storied life, which has spanned seventeen centuries across Europe, Asia, and Africa, and reveals an inspiring tale of devotion to God and an example of eternal goodness.

    The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas focuses on three aspects of Saint Nicholas—historical facts from his life, his legacy in the centuries following his death, and the legendary status that transformed his likeness into the present-day jolly, toy-bearing Santa Claus. The book vividly captures the heart and life of someone who lived long ago—and yet whose life remains an inspiration for everyone to aspire to a higher order of generosity, giving, and devotion to others.

    An instant classic by one of America’s most respected thinkers, The True Saint Nicholas is a memorable keepsake to be shared with family and friends every year to evoke the true spirit of Christmas.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHoward Books
    Release dateOct 27, 2009
    ISBN9781439166406
    Author

    William J. Bennett

    Dr. William J. Bennett is one of America's most influential and respected voices on cultural, political, and educational issues. Host of "The Bill Bennett Show" podcast, he is also the Washington Fellow of the American Strategy Group. He is the author and editor of more than twenty-five books, and lives in North Carolina.

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    • 4/5
      A simple and easy to read historical book about the original St. Nicholas. There are many legends and myths that surround the Bishop of Myra in the later third and early fourth century. Bennett sets the tone accurately within history from that period. We have no known writings by this bishop, but his impact was significant in his time.
    • 4/5
      The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas is a short book, but an enjoyable read. It is not a scholarly book on Saint Nicholas, but it is an informative book of the man and his time that will help the reader understand the traditions of history.William J. Bennett tries to get us to see Nicholas' life not through wringing out identifiable facts, for there are few, but through the life at the time. If other Christians studied books, such as the Didache, then so did Saint Nicholas. If other believers memorized certain chapters from Psalms then so did he. In so doing, Bennett fleshes out the Church Father who later became known as Santa Claus.I would have preferred an attempt to nail down more facts and to identify more sources. One does wonder how true of a portrait of this man this book really is. But like any author, Bennett makes his choices and then follows them to the conclusion. He does provide a list of other books to read. The True Saint Nicholas is a good book to be read during the Christmas season to remind us all of the history that has brought us to this point.

    Book preview

    The True Saint Nicholas - William J. Bennett

    PREFACE

    I was delighted when Howard Books suggested releasing a new edition of The True Saint Nicholas, first published nearly a decade ago. It prompted me to keep an eye out for the good old saint and fresh evidence of his legacy. Sure enough, the signs are there. After all these centuries, Saint Nicholas is still working wonders.

    In 2017, for example, more than two million Russians in Moscow and Saint Petersburg flocked to glimpse a bone fragment on loan from Saint Nicholas’s tomb in Bari, Italy. The holy relic had not been outside of Italy in more than nine hundred years. The traveling event was the result of a historic meeting the previous year between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill, leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, the first such meeting since the Great Schism split Christianity in 1054.

    People in Russia waited for up to twenty-four hours to see the relic. The lines stretched for miles.

    It’s important to be close to the grace of Saint Nicholas, one young man who drove for hours to stand in line told a Washington Post reporter. All saints are special, but this is the one most dear to us.

    Russia is a country where, for generations, a murderous communist regime had done its best to stamp out religion. Yet here was this outpouring of faith in God and veneration for a saintly man.

    Another sign: Every year, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) tracks Santa Claus as he flies around the world on Christmas Eve. The tradition dates to 1955 when, the story goes, a child misdialed a telephone number in a Sears department store newspaper advertisement that told children they could reach Santa on his private phone. The call came in to an air defense command center in Colorado Springs, prompting officials to set up a Santa hotline. Since then, every Christmas Eve, military and civilian volunteers have manned telephones answering calls from around the world about Santa’s flight and whereabouts.

    Today NORAD operates a wonderful website called NORAD Tracks Santa (www.noradsanta.org) as well as a Facebook page that posts updates on Santa’s travels. NORAD con rms Santa has arrived over Istanbul, Turkey, the site announced last December 24. Santa wants to express his thanks for all the children who left out the wonderful Turkish coffee. He said it helps with his long Christmas flight.

    I wonder if he stops for a little visit with his ancestors in Turkey, one Facebook user commented. Santa was a bishop from Turkey.

    Saint Nicholas was a Christian bishop from Myra, which was Greek and is now in Turkey, another user commented, quite correctly.

    So there he is, alive and well in cyberspace. The spirit of generosity that Saint Nicholas bequeathed to Santa Claus is at home with our modern technology. Even in a world of satellites and cell phones, the ancient saint touches us.

    Meanwhile, in New York City, a new church bearing the saint’s name has become a symbol of resilience. The original Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church had been a house of worship in Lower Manhattan since 1916. That came to a violent end during the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The collapse of the South Tower destroyed the church.

    The new Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and National Shrine, which is nearing completion as I write, stands a few yards from the old church’s site, overlooking the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. When completed, the beautiful domed church will contain a space where people of all faiths can come for reflection and prayer. It will show the will of all people to rebuild and resurrect from the ashes of 9/11, Archbishop Demetrios of America says.

    The legacy of Saint Nicholas, you see, is still very much with us. His story resonates down through the ages. It brings messages of hope, generosity, and joy. It reminds us, above all, of God’s love.

    Since the name Saint Nicholas has become associated with Christmas, I hope this little book helps you pass a quiet winter evening, perhaps beside a hearth in the glow of a Christmas tree. May the good saint’s story touch you, as it has so many, with God’s love.

    William J. Bennett

    2018

    INTRODUCTION

    When most of us hear the name Saint Nicholas, we immediately think of Santa Claus. As children, we listened wide-eyed to Clement Clarke Moore’s famous poem about the night before Christmas, when down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound. At some point along the way, we may have asked an older and wiser acquaintance why Santa sometimes goes by this alias. The answer we received was probably not very informative. And once we are all grown up, with children of our own, and by chance are asked the same question, we still are not sure. If pressed, we might guess that there was once a very good man named Nicholas, and his name somehow came to be connected with Santa Claus. But Saint Nicholas remains an elusive figure to us.

    He is elusive even to scholars who study such matters. They believe that Saint Nicholas served as a bishop during the fourth century in the town of Myra, on the coast of the eastern Mediterranean Sea. He may have attended the famous Council of Nicaea convened by Constantine the Great in 325 to resolve issues troubling the Christian Church. But the details of his life and work remain sketchy. If he wrote anything, it is long gone. The first known Nicholas biography dates to the eighth or ninth century, long after his death, when a Greek monk known as Michael the Archimandrite assembled a collection of tales about him.

    We are left to piece together his life as best we can, using what we know and a good bit of surmise to arrive at the most likely story. Often we must rely on tradition as well as clues provided by the history of the times in which he lived. If the reputation he left behind means anything, we know there was something remarkable about this holy man. For hundreds of years, his name has been invoked, his deeds recounted. His shadow falls across epochs.

    Why bother with the history of Saint Nicholas? For one thing, his is a fascinating story. Its sheer vastness of scale is astounding. It stretches from the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa to the Americas and beyond. It crosses oceans, deserts, and frozen arctic climes. This is an adventure tale complete with emperors, knights, villains, shipwrecks, kidnappings, treasure, and dark dungeons. It

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