We continue our Spider-Man Christmas with 1995s "A Matter of Faith" from Spider-Man Holiday Special #1 by Glenn Greenberg, Kevin Maguire and Jimmy Palmiotti...

This one-shot came out during the short-lived period where Ben Reilly was Spider-Man and presumed to be the original Peter Parker and the guy we all knew as Peter Parker was actually the clone.

It is a pretty straightforward, but compelling story. Spider-Man is feeling sorry for himself about how he's pretty much all alone in New York City, as Aunt May is dead and all of his friends are really Peter Parker's friends and he can't hang out with them. While he is feeling bad for himself, a woman falls from a bridge...









He has to drop Jenny off for a bit while he fights the Scorcher, a nice use of a villain from Kurt Busiek's Untold Tales of Spider-Man in the present day.

During the fight, Jenny saves a homeless man while putting her own life at risk. This inspires her to do good with her life, so Spider-Man (after he takes out the Scorcher) gets a hug from her as she decides she has a new purpose in life.

I think I would have liked to have seen her, like, get a chance to write the event up for the Daily Bugle (she's an aspiring writer) but I guess that we have to take it on "faith" that she will be okay.