If you, your family, friends, neighbors or local church set up a nativity scene for Christmas, do you put the baby Jesus in the manger when you set the nativity up? Or do you wait until Christmas Day to add the baby Jesus into the manger?
Growing up, my mom had a nativity set that she displayed starting a few weeks before Christmas. She placed the baby in the manger the whole time. It has only recently come to my attention (and I do not know how I missed this for so many years) that many Italian Catholics in Brooklyn wait until midnight on Christmas Eve to place the baby Jesus in the manger because he wasn’t born until Christmas. This tradition makes total sense but it is somehow new to me.
I’m glad that all those nativity scenes in front of homes in Brooklyn don’t have empty cribs because all those babies were stolen.
What is the tradition in your neck of the woods regarding nativity sets?
