“Today in the town of David a Savior has been born and he is Christ the Lord.”
Luke 2:11
Carefully arranged on the table is the Nativity scene — the tiny baby all glowing bright with Mary and Joseph kneeling peacefully beside the manger, and all around while angels are singing, the shepherds pose near the little drummer boy holding a lamb to give to the newborn king while three wise men enter bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh …
But wait, we’ve compressed and sanitized the events into something quite different than what happened on that Holy night so long ago.
Joseph and Mary were a poor Jewish couple living in Nazareth when a census was called requiring each man to return to his ancestral home, which for Joseph was Bethlehem. When Mary and Joseph arrived at the inn, that is “the” inn, possibly the only inn, and it was packed beyond capacity. And so, Joseph found accommodations in a stable, or probably a cave, crowded with animals, hay and a feeding trough. In Bethlehem today there is an underground cave called the Grotto of the Nativity that is generally accepted as the site of Jesus’ birth. A cave, not a wooden stable.
And the angels sang “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rest.” Luke 2:14 NIV.
The wise men from the East were nowhere around that night because that comes much later. And we don’t know if there were only three wise men because they probably traveled with an entourage for safety. But we know they brought to the child’s house, not the stable, three gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. The Nativity scene as we know it started one night in the town of Grecio, Italy. It was 1223 A.D. when St. Francis of Assisi was invited to perform the Holy Mass. Knowing the celebration of the birth of the Christ child had become increasingly secular (sound familiar?) and desiring to inspire the people, St. Francis received permission to stage a reverent little scene out on a mountain where he lay a small manger filled with hay; there was an ox and a donkey and that’s all. That night the villagers came bringing lights (torches) and singing songs of praise, “full of piety and devotion and with tears of joy they were radiant as they chanted the Holy gospel,” in the account by St. Bonaventure, a Franciscan monk, in “The Life of St. Francis of Assisi.”
The oldest carving of the Nativity scene, called a “Presepio,” was made of marble and attributed to Arnolfo di Cambio in 1289 A.D. Some of the figures are now lost and broken, but the fixture can still be seen in Rome at the Basilica of St. Mary Major.
Today Nativity scenes, also called creches, can be seen the world over, often reflecting the culture that produces them.
Today in churches and elsewhere families still participate in the recreation of that Holy night, with children in bathrobes and bright sashes wearing gold paper crowns and singing like little angels, reenacting the first Holy night.
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