A pastor is under fire after recording himself telling children waiting in line to meet Santa Claus that the man in red does not exist.
In the video posted to Facebook, pastor David Grisham, who claimed to be with Last Frontier Evangelism, walked up to the line at the Westgate mall in Amarillo, Texas, saying he was planning to tell children that “there is no Santa Claus and that Christmas is about Jesus Christ.”
According to Last Frontier Evangelism, Facebook took down the video; however Grisham’s wife, Tracy, reposted it to her page.
“Kids, I wanted to tell you today that here is no such thing as Santa Claus,” Grisham said in the video. “Santa Claus does not exist. The Christmas season is about Jesus. Jesus was born 2016 years ago, he was born in a manger in a small town called Bethlehem.”
He continued, “Don’t lie and tell your children that there is such a thing as Santa, when you know in reality that there are no flying reindeer… There is (sic) no elves making toys. You buy all of the gifts and put them under the tree, that’s the truth.”
Parents waiting in line quickly interrupted the pastor, telling him to stop “preaching” in front of the children.
Grisham, who says he lives in Anchorage, Alaska, posted a similar anti-Santa rant video on his Facebook page a few days before the mall incident. He asked others to rebuke parents for “lying to their kids.”
He wrote, “Kids are being diverted from Christ by the lie of Santa. Let’s go to the malls this Christmas shopping season and set the record straight with the kids and their lying parents.”