Here’s something you don’t want to know in the middle of the holiday gift-buying frenzy: economists have studied gift giving and they have found that a gift is worth about 80% of what the giver paid for it. In other words, when economists asked the recipient what he or she thought it was worth (to them, not what it would cost in a store), the recipients generally valued the present they had received at about 80% of what the giver had forked over to buy it. The conclusion of the economists was obvious: give cash or don’t bother giving.
Now, one could argue (and some of you are doing so right now) that a well-chosen, thoughtful gift is worth more than its economic value. In fact, even a poorly chosen gift, if it was given earnestly and not indifferently or out of obligation, is worth more than its monetary value. A gift chosen in love, you might say, is valuable even when it is totally useless and uglier than the worst hand-knitted sweater ever concocted. I’d buy that argument.
And I’d make another argument right on top of it. If you want to be a good gift-giver, emulate the guy who started the whole tradition of Christmas gift-giving – Saint Nicholas of Myra, who is the patron saint of sailors and children.
Today is St. Nicholas Day. On this day we remember with thanksgiving the life of Bishop Nicholas of Myra. Nicholas died in the year 342. He is reputed to have attended the Council of Nicaea, where he lost his temper during a theological argument and punched the heretic Arias. (You had to be tough to go to a church meeting in the 4th century.) He was imprisoned and tortured under the Emperor Diocletian.
His association with Christmas gifts has nothing to do with Christmas, but it does have something to tell us about gift-giving. Nicholas was known to secretly give gifts of money and food to the poor, especially to poor children. Even 4th century economists would have to concede that gifts of money and food to the hungry and homeless are economically rational gifts.
So, this Christmas, instead of puzzling over what to give “the person who has everything,” instead be like the real old Saint Nick, and give gifts to those who have nothing.
Prayer for St. Nicholas Day:
Grant, Almighty God, that your church may be so inspired by the example of your servant Nicholas of Myra, that it may never cease to work for the welfare of children, the safety of sailors, the relief of the poor, and the help of those tossed by tempests of doubt or grief; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. – The prayer is from Lesser Feasts and Fasts, (New York: Church Publishing, 2018