Midwest Nativity

I’ve never been comfortable with the images portraying the Nativity scene within a cave. Yes, it may be the case that the stable where Jesus was born was a cave, but I don’t find that version of the scene the tiniest bit peaceful and joyous.

My fault, entirely - think “seriously claustrophobic” and you begin to understand why me envisioning the Nativity as a “sweet cave scene” isn’t even a remote possibility. I can laugh uproariously throughout the scariest monster movie, which makes me an uncomfortable movie companion, but for heavens sake, why would the hungry Velociraptor chase the little bitty humans around in a kitchen when 40 tons of edible herbivore is lumbering about merely twenty yards away?

Sorry. Got carried away there.

Anyways, I don’t happily “do” enclosed spaces, nor do I enjoy depictions of them in any form. I can stand on a cliff or pick up a snake, but show me Harrison Ford crawling into a drain and I’m outta there. Nope. Do not like that. Can’t watch. Not even with gorgeous Harry as the star.

So.

I’ve always visualized the Nativity in a barn, which if it contains horses (and even a cow or two) is called a stable here in the Midwest.

Semantics, perhaps, but there it is, and tonight we’ll celebrate the Nativity, with me picturing the newborn Babe in a barn.

I’m sure Jesus understands.

Merry Christmas!

“In mundo nascitur,
Pannis involvitur
Praesepi ponitur
Stabulo brutorum,
Rector supernorum.
Perdidit spolia
Princeps infernorum.”

(He is born on earth, wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger in an animals’ stable, the ruler of the heavens. The prince of hell has lost his spoils - Piae Cantiones, 1582)