The mayor of the North Pole has found his very own Grinch. The United States of America’s postal department has decided to shut down the voluntary service given by a small town in Alaska that has created magic for children for 55 years. Thousands of volunteers have been answering children’s letters to Santa Claus forwarded to them by the US postal service. But last year one volunteer was discovered to be a registered sex offender, and the USPS, alarmed at the possibility of privacy violation through details in the children’s letters, has switched off the magic. For the mayor, the USPS is close to Theodor Geisel or Dr Seuss’s Grinch, who stole Christmas. The warmth created by the work of people trying to give unknown children the intangible gifts of trust, hope, and love may have taken years to spread but is easy to destroy. The USPS apparently finds Operation Santa too risky to carry on with.

As with many Christmas tales, this one too is touched with the quality of fable. A world of innocence rudely shattered by the entrance of crime and sex is one way of looking at it. Or it could be the gossamer fragility of human connection, torn to shreds by the clumping feet of Grinch-like killjoys. But there is another, more adult, fable too. The man for whose sake Operation Santa is being shut down may not have been looking out for tempting details, but instead trying to be part of a joyful community effort. If the justice system lets him go free, why should the USPS brand him unfit to reply to children’s letters? So can an offender never outgrow his reputation? Or is all this an elaborate plan to make children more ‘realistic’? Because of the shadow that has fallen on this rare world of human magic, this year numerous children will be disappointed that Santa never replied, and as many adults near the North Pole left without a way to communicate the contagious warmth of the soul.