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Is There a Santa Claus?
The New York Sun ^ | September 21, 1897 | Editorial Board

Posted on 12/22/2025 12:14:35 PM PST by Bratch

Dear Editor—

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.

Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.”

Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Virginia O’Hanlon
115 West Ninety Fifth Street

(Excerpt) Read more at nysun.com ...


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KEYWORDS: christmas; thesun; virginia
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Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.

We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! He lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.


1 posted on 12/22/2025 12:14:35 PM PST by Bratch
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To: Bratch

Merry Christmas! 🎄


2 posted on 12/22/2025 12:16:05 PM PST by Bratch
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To: Bratch

Merry Christmas!


3 posted on 12/22/2025 12:18:04 PM PST by No name given ( Anonymous is who you’ll know me as )
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To: Bratch; pookie18

4 posted on 12/22/2025 12:20:57 PM PST by Tell It Right (1 Thessalonians 5:21 -- Put everything to the test, hold fast to that which is true.)
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To: Bratch

Santa Claus is just Odin in drag.


5 posted on 12/22/2025 12:24:52 PM PST by Tom Tetroxide (Psalm 146:3 "Do not trust in princes, in the Son of Man, who has no salvation.")
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To: Bratch

There’s a movie about this The reporter had lost his wife or someone


6 posted on 12/22/2025 12:26:01 PM PST by Tennessee Nana
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To: Bratch

“Being a Christian was not easy when St. Nicholas was born in 270 A.D. The Romans considered Christians to be a lower class of people. As a bishop, Nicholas had to guide his flock through horrible persecution.

Despite these harrowing trials, Nicholas became famous for his generosity and secret gift giving. One story tells of a father who was unable to pay his three daughters’ dowries. Due to his poverty, he faced the unimaginable decision of selling his daughters into servitude.

Hearing the family’s plight, Nicholas went to their house in the night, tossing purses of gold coins through the window. It is said that one of the purses landed in the stockings hung by the fireplace to dry, starting the tradition of hanging stockings for Christmas.”

Catholic teaching states there is a communion of saints. That said, st Nick watches over gift giving and generosity at Christmas

No one has to believe this.

I do. It is the spirit that moves in when people don’t have time, money or energy to get it together for Christmas.


7 posted on 12/22/2025 12:30:18 PM PST by stanne
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To: Bratch

My six year old granddaughter was asking everyone, and getting the same non-committal answer. So she asked the google home device. Got the same answer.


8 posted on 12/22/2025 12:33:03 PM PST by FatherofFive (We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor)
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To: Tell It Right
He's not!

"She" is:


9 posted on 12/22/2025 12:37:50 PM PST by pookie18 (You don’t have to be high on crack to enjoy Pookie’s Toons! - Tell It Right)
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To: Bratch

I had no clue where the line came from “Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Clause”. I assumed it was a movie.

So it was a genuine letter that a major paper replied to. Now I know “the REST of the story.


10 posted on 12/22/2025 12:38:54 PM PST by Freedom_Is_Not_Free (America -- July 4, 1776 to November 3, 2020 -- R.I.P.)
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To: Bratch

Fred Gailey proved Santa’s existence conclusively in a NYS Superior Court because he demonstrated that the federal government delivered letters to Santa Claus.


11 posted on 12/22/2025 12:48:06 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: Bratch
Ernest Saves Christmas
12 posted on 12/22/2025 12:50:19 PM PST by Republican Wildcat
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To: Bratch

“Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Virginia O’Hanlon”

Ask all of the Immigrants (legal and illegal) and they will tell Democrats Exist and they get Free stuff. So Yes, for them, there is a Santa Claus.


13 posted on 12/22/2025 12:54:21 PM PST by Pete Dovgan
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To: Bratch

NORAD has a tracker and it’s maned by the most vigilant watchmen.


14 posted on 12/22/2025 12:58:37 PM PST by Track9 (Liberal tears make me smile. Thank you DJT!)
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To: All

I asked ChatGPT if Santa Claus was real and it told me to grow up but ChatGPT hates me.


15 posted on 12/22/2025 12:59:39 PM PST by BipolarBob (These violent delights have violent ends.)
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To: Bratch

Yep. In every Mall and outside of shops ringing a bell. How he gets around so fast is a wonderment.


16 posted on 12/22/2025 1:15:10 PM PST by SkyDancer ( ~ Am Yisrael Chai ~)
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To: SkyDancer

Quantum entanglement.


17 posted on 12/22/2025 1:23:42 PM PST by Hootowl
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To: Pete Dovgan

Um, not unless Santa is a Time Lord. So, do you believe in Time Lords? (-;


18 posted on 12/22/2025 1:55:44 PM PST by Bethaneidh
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To: stanne

>> No one has to believe this. I do. It is the spirit that moves in...

Good for you. I shall, too.

Merry Christmas!


19 posted on 12/22/2025 2:08:25 PM PST by Nervous Tick (Hope, as a righteous product of properly aligned Faith, IS in fact a strategy.)
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To: Bratch

When I was 4 or 5 I told my friend (same age) that there was no Santa. Boy, did his mom give my mom hell!


20 posted on 12/22/2025 2:11:51 PM PST by NewHampshireDuo ( )
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