Joe Biel

There were three children that were facing destitution.

And so he took gold coins and he slipped them in through their windowsill and, you know, essentially so that the family would be able to survive outside of poverty.

And this story was so inspiring to me.

people in that region you know what would today be turkey that they began celebrating you know incorporating presents into the season and you know it doesn't entirely fit the tradition because you know he's helping out somebody that is ostensibly a stranger who is in need but

people took it initially as that you would just sort of give presents to everybody and then that shifted more and more into the nuclear family that you would give presents to people that you were related to and then you know and then that was able to blossom over hundreds of years

Right.

So there was a point in time where the Christians actually tried to stomp out Christmas as unrelated to the faith.

And so, again, much like the Soviets, this was fairly difficult because, you know, people really liked it.

It was a fun holiday.

And so...

From what we know, we would have people gather.

And similarly to how pagans celebrated the changing of seasons and the lengthening and shortening of the year or of the daylight during the calendar year.

christmas was part of that where people would you know gather in their homes they would have public celebrations they would have you know different ways of essentially celebrating usually you know and they would you know they would have feasts and things like that which i guess that's a part of the tradition that has been upheld

Christmas was connected to children in the first place because St.

Nick, and this is again a non-verifiable story, but this is the version of the story that is shared.

went into a pub one day and he found well he just knew they don't really explain how he had this information but that there were three children being pickled in the bar by the barkeep and he reincarnated the children again this is one of his many miracles and this is how he was thought of as the patron saint of children

at that time and this again just i think it just captured imaginations you know not because of how many details are incomplete in this story but because of the idea that he was thought to care about children so much that he went out of his way to you know rescue three kids that he didn't even know and you know and this is at a time when life expectancy is not what it is today

And, you know, and so I think those are the kinds of stories about Christmas and about Santa and about St.

Nick that to really hold on to is like, how do you live your values?

And, you know, sort of who do you want to be?