06/12/2020
As we are at that time of the year again. A reminder from last year:
Did you know that 🎅🏼 SANTA CLAUS🎅🏼, was actually Saint Nicholas (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343) who was born, became a bishop, achieved sainthood, and eventually buried in the land which is in present-day Turkey?
Accounts of Saint Nicholas state that, he was born in the city of Patara (Lycia et Pamphylia), a port on the Mediterranean Sea, in Asia Minor in the Roman Empire, to a wealthy family of Greek Christians.
After visiting the Holy Land, Nicholas returned to Myra. The bishop of Myra, had recently died and the priests in the city had decided that the first priest to enter the church that morning would be made bishop. Nicholas went to the church to pray and was therefore proclaimed the new bishop.
Among many other legends about the life of St. Nicholas, the most renowned today is that he would drop small bags of gold coins down the chimneys of houses with poor girls who were old enough to marry, but had no dowry. Another story depicts he would leave gold coins in the shoes of the poor who put them out for him. Sanctified for his good works, he became the patron saint of virgins, sailors, children, and pawnbrokers.
St. Nicholas Church is a museum and an ancient Byzantine Greek Church located in modern-day town of Demre, Antalya Province, Turkey. St. Nicholas lived and worked here during the 4th-century. He was later transmuted into the jolly Christmas elf called Sinterklaas in Holland (and similar names in other European countries), and later Santa Claus in North America when the Dutch settled there.
The church was built in AD 520 on the foundations of an older Christian church under the orders of Theodosius II over the site of the church, where Nicholas had served as bishop and his remains were moved to a sarcophagus in that church. But in 1087 most of his bones were taken by force to Bari in Italy, and the remainder taken to Venice in 1100. Church in Demre is on UNESCO’s tentative list to become a World Heritage Site.
You can learn more at storeanatolia.com
