NORFOLK, Neb. – Ten minutes into Norfolk First United Methodist Church’s “Pancakes with Santa,” a voice came bellowing into its Wesley Hall.
“HO, HO, HO,” the basso voice of Santa Claus said upon his entrance, “Merry Christmas!”
Preschoolers and toddlers searched quickly to see where Santa was. Some jumped up and down, others yelled for the man in the crimson red suit with a full beard.
While Santa appearing at a Christmas breakfast is hardly unique in churches across the country and around the world, two factors make the northeast Nebraska church’s special.
The church refuses to take any money from its guests.
The Santa is the church’s own pastor.
The seventh annual “Pancakes with Santa” on Dec. 6 served 250 people, most of them not connected with the church.
“Everybody has a good time,” Rev. Neil Gately, the co-senior pastor, said. “Next to Easter Sunday morning and Christmas Eve communion service, this is probably everybody’s favorite thing of the year.”
As Santa, Rev. Neil Gately listens to the requests of children at Norfolk First UMC. Photos by David Burke
The pancake breakfast is one of four food events the church has in the year — breakfast with an Easter egg hunt, Vacation Bible School, and a fall festival, this year with a tailgate theme — where the community of 22,000 is invited with no charge.
Gately — who has co-pastored Norfolk First with his wife, Rev. Bridget Gately, for seven years, as well as nearby Winside UMC — gets asked yearly what harm there could be in putting out an offering plate or some vessel for donations.
“The offering plate says we expect something,” he said. “If you want to look at it solely from the cynical financial perspective, if we would gain one regular attendee who puts five bucks in the plate every week, at the end of the year we’re going to have $200. This isn’t about trying to cover our expenses, it’s about investing in our community. Maybe in response our community will invest in us, and maybe not. If nothing else, everybody has a great time.”
The pastor and church members have instituted a “three strikes” philosophy to would-be donors. The first is to politely refuse. The second is inviting them to put it in the offering next Sunday. The third, after all niceties are exhausted, is to grudgingly accept.
Children make Nativity-themed crafts with volunteers from the church in the nearby fellowship hall.
Besides meeting with Santa, children are invited to create display crafts in the nearby fellowship hall helped by volunteers and staff members from the church. Everything is put into a plastic bag that includes information about the church, including holiday events and Christmas Eve services.
“Our engagement success story, our payoff, has not been what we anticipated, but it’s really, really great,” Gately said. “We only had a couple of people over the years turn around and come to our church because of one of our free events.”
Many of those who come to the event have not been to a church or are lapsed members, he said.
“We began with the hope that the event might bring in new members,” Gately said. “Instead, Pancakes with Santa has become an on-ramp for people who recently started attending. These new folks are drawn to a church that serves the larger community. Rather than brand new people entering through the front door, our new constituents are making connections by coming through the back door to serve.”
“We may have our agenda and our goals for the event, but don’t be so focused on our event and our goals that we don’t see where the unexpected victories may be,” he added.
Volunteers at the church enjoy themselves as much as the kids, Gately said, and church council chair Deb Beutler said, “We do have a pretty good time back here.”
“It brings us together as a family,” she said. “It’s just a joy to get together, and to be with these kids is amazing. We love to go around and see the happy smiles. It’s a fun, fun project every year.”
Santa and two children smile for the camera during Pancakes with Santa.
Beutler said she’s a proponent of the free pancake feed.
“This is what we want to do for our community,” she said. “It’s giving back to our community and letting them know that we appreciate them, we want to do for them, and it’s our mission to take care of our neighbors.”
A community member had played Santa during most of the history of the event, but when he died last year, the offer was made to their white-bearded pastor.
“It’s his alter ego,” Beutler said with a laugh.
Although Gately had played Santa with a fake beard during his college years in his native Arkansas, he bought his own costume within the past decade and began playing Kris Kringle across the community during the past five years.
But playing Santa in the church, where he was already known as Pastor Neil, left him cautious.
“I didn’t want to interfere with the myth, the idea of having a Santa they know,” he said.
Gately said he kept in mind a parishioner known as “Santa Mike” during his nine years as pastor of Topeka Grace UMC, and how Gately's two children reacted to him.
Santa Mike was known by that nickname throughout the year, never hiding his long white beard.
Santa Claus makes his entrance to the delight of church volunteers.
“They had no problem with the dissonance. That’s Santa, it’s fine,” Gately said. “I played close attention to him when we went out and learned from him.”
Santa Mike worked at malls during the final six weeks of the year, and “He’d always come back and tell me the stories. I was prepared for the stuff that happened,” Gately said.
Among those precautions is tempering the requests of the young believers.
When asked for a new puppy or kitten, he quickly responds that “Santa doesn’t do living things,” and that was a request for their family members.
When he gets a request for the latest tech, he tells them, “Santa does things based on parental approval.”
And when he gets asked for an ill grandparent to get better, he cautiously informs them, “There’s some things even Santa can’t do,” he adds. “But it’s OK to ask, because it’s OK to want someone to be better.”
Families sign up for pictures when they enter the church and are called by number. For some, it’s a family picture. For others it’s kids that Gately choreographs on Santa’s lap or on the bench where he’s sitting.
He adjusts for everything from frightened infants to skeptical preteens.
“You just have to be where they are,” he said. “Some of them are playful, some of them are resentful that they’re too old to have them take their picture with Santa.”
A church member sits at the low-rise stage where Santa’s bench and decorations are on display, taking photos to send digitally to families, who are welcome to take pictures with their own cellphones.
Church volunteers say Pancakes with Santa is one of the highlights of the year.
Gately said there are some comparisons to being a pastor and being Santa.
“You are somebody who is hopefully a safe person, somebody who’s approachable,” he said. “I’ve never had someone chew me out as a Santa. But even when someone does that as a pastor, part of it is they are comfortable with being honest with you. That compliment doesn’t always feel nice, but it is because of relationship.”
On Christmas night, for the third time, Gately will head to Arrowhead Stadium for a Kansas City Chiefs game, passing out 1,000 candy canes — half of them in the parking lot, half of them inside the stadium.
His first time at a Christmas Chiefs game, he wore a Santa hat and was whispered by a fan sitting a row behind him, “I’m pretty sure my son thinks you’re the real thing.”
Gately turned around, asked if he was pleased with his presents that morning and got into a conversation.
“I saw how much fun that was,” he said.
The next time there was a Christmas game at Arrowhead, Gately was dressed in full Santa regalia, standing in the concourse of the stadium and greeting fans.
“The mayor and the local weatherman wanted a picture with me, not me wanting a selfie with them,” he said with a laugh.
Sometimes, he said, all a fan wanted was a hug from Santa.
Gately still fielded skeptics, including a preteen who asked if he was real, and he responded, “I don’t know, are you really you?”
A longtime theater performer, Gately said he’s used to thinking on his feet, whether it’s in a stadium or church hall.
“It’s fun being playful, but you also have to be ready,” he said. “You don’t know whether you’re going to be comforting a child who’s uncomfortable about getting their picture made or trying to cheer up a child who’s getting their picture made.”
Norfolk First children’s director, Tammy Brabec, said Gately is perfect for the part.
“He brings the energy. He’s energetic, he’s exciting,” she said. “You can see him walking around, fist-bumping kids and making them excited about Christmas.”
Santa gives a hug to a young fan.
“He’s the perfect Santa,” church member Amanda Warrick added. “He fits the part.”
Once Gately-as-Santa entered the hall, he quickly doffed his Santa jacket on a coatrack and spent the rest of the day in suspenders and a holiday-print shirt. The beard he’s worn for years is touched up by turning his mustache into handlebars for the season.
After losing 120 pounds over the past few years, Gately said he had to buy Santa a new pair of pants but had to return a newer jacket because he didn’t like the fit nor the buttons.
Gately, whose 60th birthday was five days before this year’s Pancakes with Santa, said his is contemplating it becoming a fulltime retirement career.
“I’m very interested in doing a stint as a Santa for five, six weeks,” he said. “It’s not lost on me that there’s baggage that comes with Santa, that there’s a level of commercialism and indulgence and all that kind of stuff. But you can either turn away from and let it go its own way, or you can turn into it and try to redirect it a little bit.”
In his own way, Gately said, he can fight back against the over commercialization of the holiday.
“Me doing Santa isn’t going to make it more commercial, but I can try to dial that Santa back a little bit,” he said. “Maybe we can make it a little more traditional piece than the guy who’s there to sell pictures.”
As Santa, Rev. Neil Gately listens to the requests of children at Norfolk First UMC. Photos by David Burke
