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Available for viewing December 2023 - February 2, 2024
St. Francis of Assisi who lived in poverty, humility and simplicity recreated for his towns people and his confreres the Bethlehem scene of Christ's birth in a cave in Greccio, Italy. It was Christmas Eve in 1223 after having pled to the Supreme Pontiff: "I want to do something that will recall the memory of that Child who was born in Bethlehem, to see with bodily eyes the inconveniences of His infancy, how He lay in a manger, and how the ox and ass stood by."
Bagni di Luca, Italy is the location where the artisan, Emmanuele Fontanini in 1908 began creating Presepi; hand painted figures to be displayed in homes and churches all over Europe. In 1973 the Fontanini Nativity figures were imported to the United States. It was not long after that when Sylvia Salinas, Our Director of Religious Education, began collecting the figurines and Bethlehem village pieces. Her collection began with the Holy Family and through the 50 years since she has acquired the complete scene of the Life of Jesus on display.
The Holy Father in his recent book, Christmas at the Nativity said,” I am sure that the first Nativity scene, which accomplished a great work of evangelization, can also be an occasion today to summon forth awe and wonder.”
We invite you to come and see with your own eyes the scene St. Francis brought to the faithful that night of when Christ was born as we celebrate and commemorate the 800 anniversary of the first Nativity.
" Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us."
-Luke 2:15b