Nativities, Christingles and Mulled Wine

The preparations for Christmas in the Green household really started in earnest this week. First off it was Son's Nativity, next week it's Daughter's Nativity and yesterday we hit the shops (and the plastic) hard to get most of our Christmas shopping done. Oh, and the kids met Santa Claus.

This morning we're off to a Christingle service and then this afternoon we're going round to a neighbour's to enjoy some mulled wine and mince pies. But what are the origins of Nativity plays, Christingles and mulled wine?

One man is credited with creating the Christmas crib more than any other, and that is the 13th century Saint Francis of Assissi. In 1220, Francis made the pilgrimage to Bethlehem. While there, he saw how Christmas was celebrated in the town of Jesus' birth and was so impressed that he asked the Pope if he might recreate something like it in his own Italian home of Greccio.

And of course during the Medieval period, mystery plays - with mummers acting out stories from the Bible - were one of the most popular forms of Christmas entertainment. Both survive to this day, but it is normally children who act out the Nativity story itself and not the adults anymore.

The physical form of the Christingle is an orange, tied with a red ribbon and stuck with a candle and cocktail sticks bearing fruit and nuts. It is a symbolic object particularly used in Christian Advent services, hence the name given to a particular type of religious service. The word Christingle actually means 'Christ Light'. Both the Christingles that are made and the Christingle services that take place in church, celebrate Jesus coming into the world, in his aspect as the Light of the World.

The first Christingle service was held in a castle in Germany, on Christmas Eve 1747, by a bishop of the Moravian Church known as Pastor John. He wanted to find some simple way of teaching people about the true meaning of Christmas. His solution was to prepare a simple symbol which would make the Christmas message seem fresh and alive to them. During the informal service, Pastor John gave each child present a lighted candle wrapped in a red ribbon. He then intoned a prayer.

You can find out more about the origins of the Nativity play and the Christingle in What is Myrrh Anyway? Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Christmas, published by Icon Books.

And if you think the idea of warm mince pies and mulled wine on a cold December day sounds like a good one, follow this link to a piece I posted last year that includes a recipe for the utterly delicious Bishop's wine.

Christmas carols - a fictional fantasy?

The Rt Rev Nick Baines, Bishop of Croydon, has branded Christmas carols as being nonsense - saying that adults should be embarrassed to sing them.

He also blasts nativity plays as "fictional fantasy" and claims that songs like Away In A Manger give children a "misleading" image of Jesus.

He says: "I find it bizarre when I see parents singing Away In A Manger as if it related to reality. I can understand little children being taken with the sort of baby of whom it can be said 'no crying he makes'. But how can adults sing this without embarrassment? If we sing nonsense, is it any surprise that children grow into adults and throw out the tearless baby Jesus with Father Christmas and other fantasy figures?"

Has he not heard of symbolism - something that is vital to the whole Christmas faith? I think he's treading on thin ice here. The Church needs its own to support it, not slate one of its most popular festivals which draws people in like at no other time in the year.

He also slates Once In Royal David's City for saying that children should be "mild" and "obedient", saying that "This sounds suspiciously like Victorian behaviour control." Well he would do, he's from Croydon.

His rant appears in his new book called Why Wish You a Merry Christmas? and you can pick up a copy here, if you'd like to read more.

22 December - Where did the Christmas crib scene originate?

It's that time of year now, when families start to visit church to take part in a crib service. The children among the congregation are invited to place the kings, shepherds, et al, into a pre-prepared stable scene. Actually there's one outside the church opposite my house. But where does this practice of recreating the Nativity tableau come from?

Well, as you can imagine, What is Myrrh Anyway? has the answers, but just to give you a taster... One man is credited with creating the Christmas crib more than any other, and that is the thirteenth-century Saint Francis of Assisi (and it's not his only connection to Christmas either).

In 1220, Francis made the pilgrimage to Bethlehem. While there, he saw how Christmas was celebrated in the town of Jesus’ birth and was so impressed that he asked the Pope, Honorious III, if he might recreate something like it in his own Italian home of Greccio.

With the help of a local landowner, Gionvanni Velita, and his friends, Francis succeeded in creating his own representation of the Nativity in a cave, surrounded by candles. Details over the actual participants in his Nativity scene vary, with some saying that Francis used statues to represent the holy family, while others say claim that real people, dressed in appropriate costumes, fulfilled the role. However, all the sources agree on the fact that at the centre of the scene was a straw-filled manger surrounded by real animals.

These days, most families have to settle for a wooden replica if they want to recreate a crib scene in their own home. In 1562 the Jesuits put up a crib in Prague, and this is considered to be the first crib of the modern kind.

In different countries the traditional Nativity scene has different names, of course. In Italy it is known as presepe or presepio; in Portuguese it is known as presépio, in Catalan it's the pessebre, in Spanish the name goes between El Belén (for Bethlehem, where Jesus was born) and also Nacimiento, Portal or Pesebre. The Maltese name is Presepju and the Czech names are betlém and jesličky. In Poland it is known as szopka, from Polish for 'small crib', in Croatian it is jaslice. In the Philippines, it is called a Belen (due to Spanish Influence). The Dutch name kerststal refers to the stable in which Jesus was born. The Scandinavian words julkrubba (Swedish) and julekrybbe (Norwegian and Danish) are made from the words for yule and manger. And in Russian and Ukrainian culture there was a type of portable Christmas puppet theatre called vertep, known in Belarus as batleyka, from 'Bethlehem'. So there you go.