December 24, 2006
So jolly and quick
The small town of Kale in Turkey has a few claims to fame. There are some lovely Roman ruins around town; one of Turkey's major industrial conglomerates, the Kale Group, is based there; and the city surrounds the ancient city of Myra, jewel of the Lycian Alliance. Myra was part of early Christendom, and its bishophric produced a man of renown in the fourth century: Nicholas of Bari. Little is known about Nicholas' life; veneration began relatively soon after his death, and to this day, his remains are said to miraculously generate water ("manna of Saint Nicholas") held to have curative properties. Nicholas is one of the most important saints in several Orthodox traditions; he is the patron saint of sailors, pawnbrokers, children, and thieves. And yet in America, he is, by and large, remembered thanks to two lines from one poem, written by a farmer named Henry Livingstone and for a hundred years published under the name of Clement Moore:
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there
Why pick on Saint Nick?
(more...)