Does anyone remember Dana Carvey's old Saturday Night Live skit "Church Chat"?  As the holiday of Christmas draws near, I'm fondly reminded of a holiday edition of the skit where Church Lady (Dana Carvey's flamboyant character in the sketch) draws a curious parallel between jolly Old St. Nick and the fallen angel Satan, in which she rearranges those awesome little plastic magnet letters to show that "SANTA" is an anagram for "SATAN".  Well, apparently that's not all they have in common.  I have done some additional research that shows there may be evil afoot this holiday season.

  • Everyone knows that First-Class postage stamps come in packs of 20, with a total value of $7.40 ($0.37/stamp).  Not so this time of year.  I ran to the post office a few days ago to grab some stamps for holiday mail and thought I would save time by using the automatic stamp vending machine.  I didn't know that I would be buying evil stamps.  I discovered that, just in time for the holiday season, you can get these "wonderful" Santa stamps.  Curiously though, instead of the traditional pack of 20, I received a bright red booklet of 18 stamps, coming to a total cost of $6.66!

  • Dictionary.com defines "St. Nick" as

    n : the legendary patron saint of children [syn: Santa Claus, Kriss Kringle, Father Christmas, Saint Nick, St. Nick]

    • This same source defines "Old Nick" as

    n : The Devil; Satan

    In recent times, some people have started using the popular name of "Old St. Nick" to refer to Santa Claus, which, by these aforementioned denotations, seems to be simply a combination of "Old Nick" and "St. Nick".  Are we saying that there is both a little naughty and a little nice in this present-giving legend?

  • Now, those two facts aside, clearly the Robot Santa of Futurama fame does much to explain the truth about the man in red.  Although, to be honest, I actually like the Robot Devil more - his character and plot lines are more compelling than the Robot Santa.  I have heard of an issue of the Futurama comic book in which the two team up... simply more fuel for my fire.

Unfortunately, I don't have any conclusive proof showing that Santa Claus is the adversarial Satan, master of darkness, bringer of ill luck, etc. However, I am hoping to provide you with some 'food for thought' this holiday season (I'm sure that with the many wonderful meals headed your way, you'll have enough of the other kind of food).  Anyone else with conspiracy theories for this time of year?