A Chimney Too Far 0

An Italian village is up in arms because a local priest spilled the beans:

Angry parents in an Italian Alpine town dressed as elves this week in protest after a Sunday school priest told their children Father Christmas didn’t exist.

(snip)

“Sooner or later all children bitterly discover that Father Christmas doesn’t exist and that gifts aren’t bought by a magic sleigh pulled by reindeer but by mum and dad,” a parent told La Stampa.

I find the quotation in the second paragraph to be rather interesting. I don’t remember any bitter discoveries, nor do I remember any kids going around gleefully bursting other kids’ bubbles back in the olden days, when I was a young ‘un.

When I was little, the closest I came to a “bitter discovery” was my older cousin’s replying, when I asked him what Santa Claus brought him, “I’m too old now. Santa doesn’t visit me any more.” I puzzled at the statement at the time, and then one day it made sense. When you reach the right age, somehow you just know.

In my own family, the youngest is fully nine years younger than his siblings. The older ones freely and wordlessly united to preserve the myth for their brother. If “bitterly discovering” were somehow a rite of Christmas passage, I rather doubt that they would have done so.

Indeed, if “bitterly discovering” were part of the package, the myth would have died long ago.

Aside:

Follow the link: there seem to be other, more compelling reasons to put this priest out to pasture.