I love kids. I love Christmas. And I love travel. So I couldn't ask for a better job than the one I've got. Of course, Father Christmas is only my professional name. My real name is Nicholas.
I suppose I count as celebrity, which is a very strange feeling, because nobody ever sees me in the flesh. But I try to avoid being like those public figures who pull on their image like a wet-suit when they're working, and take it off again at the end of the day. I like to think that I'm exactly the same in my private life as I am when I'm whizzing around the country delivering toys and dolls and packets of sweets. (Though the red suit is strictly my working outfit: I certainly don't wear it to church, or even down the pub!)
Being true to myself and my little 'customers' is very important to me. It's all part of what being a Christian means to me. To my mind, hypocrisy is one of the worst of all the sins.
Mind you, it's not just a question of ethics: in my job, there's a very practical point to it as well. I mean, what if I were all jolly and ho-ho-ho up front, and then some kid got on the wrong side of me and I snapped at him or her? You can imagine the headlines, can't you: 'Father Christmas bullies young child','It's not only Georgy Porgy who makes them cry','Do we want this thug in our grotto?'
Seriously, though, if you upset the kids, before you know it you've lost their trust. And in my job, that's the last thing you can afford to do. The trust of a child is as delicate as an egg. Holding it safe and warm in your hand takes a lot of care and commitment. And you only have to drop it once to crack open the shell that protects their innocence from the real world. Yes, they're going to lose it some day, but I think we owe it to them to let them hang on to it for as long as possible.
That's probably the most difficult part of my job: trying to act as a buffer between innocence and experience, especially with all the pressure that gets put on the poor little mites. Advertising campaigns that start in August, merchandising that stresses acquisition rather than enjoyment, marketing that pits the expertise of highly-paid adults against the naivety of children. Sometimes it seems that the whole period between the summer holidays and Boxing Day is just one long TV commercial. It's during these times that I find my faith so important to me. If it weren't for my faith, I could easily slip into despair, start thinking What?s the point', start to consider giving up.
Still, I can be very firm of purpose when necessary (pig-headed, my wife calls it!), and I'm not going to be hi-jacked by a bunch of men in suits. So there's one thing I'm determined to hang onto: I'm still Father Christmas. Not Father Xmas, or Father Boxing Day, or Father Give-Me-A-Present. As I always say: take Christ out of Father Christmas, and what are you left with? Fathermas: just a word, with no meaning to it.
Things are a lot different from when I first started. These days I have to carry nearly three times as many sacks as I used to, which means I've had to seriously upgrade my sleigh's reindeer-power. Still, with more central heating and less open fires, at least my dry-cleaning bills aren't as high as they were.
People seem to have forgotten what Christmas is supposed to be about. If you don't believe me, try finding Christmas cards with nativity scenes on them. Robins, stagecoaches in the snow, puddings, snowflakes, Christmas trees, polar bears, holly, snowmen, hunting scenes, penguins, thousands to choose from. A simple baby in a home-made crib? Bor-ing!
And nobody bothers to tell the kids anymore. True, the story of Baby Jesus can get really sticky and sentimental if you're not careful. But the kids can understand it, especially the younger ones. And quite frankly, I'd rather they got sentimental over Baby Jesus than waste their innocence on Baby Barbie or Baby Pokemon. As it is, half of them spend the Season of Peace and Goodwill blasting each other to bits on their computers.
From a personal point of view, one of the things I regret about Christmas is that my work stops me from going to Midnight Mass; I always used to enjoy that. Still, putting my work first puts me in some very good company: nurses, doctors, policemen, firemen, the list is endless. They all give up their own party time for the sake of others. And that's an oddity, because even the agnostics and atheists among them are showing a Christian attitude.
But there's one thing that troubles me. Here I am, a fully paid-up member of the Communion of Saints, yet I'm becoming increasingly seen as a pagan figure, the acceptable face of greed, the god of Gimme-gimme.
And that leads me into a couple of dilemmas. First, I really love seeing the delight on the faces of the kids when they get something they've set their heart on, whether it be a Teletubby or a bicycle. But if the retail chains manage to paganise me, will a child's gratitude be enough?
And the second is: is it better to celebrate Christmas without Jesus than not to celebrate it at all?
Personally, I look upon today's Christmas as a holding operation. Keep it alive, and one day some of the kids might ask why we celebrate it. Even if they treat the Nativity as just another story, at least they'll have heard the story. And one day, perhaps, they'll understand the real meaning of Christmas.
In the meantime, I'll put on my red suit and my jolliest smile, load up my sacks of presents, and make that frantic trip down from the North Pole.
I mean, I couldn't let the kids down, could I? Especially on Christmas Day.
Father Christmas (real name Saint Nicholas, and nicknamed Santa Claus) was born around the turn of the 3rd/4th Century. As Bishop of Myra in the early church, he attended the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD where, among other matters, he helped to condemn the Arian heresy and formulate the Nicene Creed. Later, he became patron saint of Russia, as well as of pawnbrokers, scholars and children. He came to Britain from Germany in about 1840.
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