Susan Gately
A group of children and their families used the Christmas season to help reinforce the message that Christ is at the centre of the festival by distributing ‘baby Jesus’ figures to families to place in their homes.
The project called ‘Jesus has been left out’ aims to put Jesus back to the centre of Christmas while raising money for victims of the devastating hurricane in Puerto Rico earlier this year.
One family in Limerick was amongst those who handed out statues of Christ and parishioners were asked to take a figure of the baby Jesus to give it to a family member or friend without a crib this year or may have stopped coming to Mass regularly.
“People were really delighted to take the statues, many of them taking more than one to give to their children. Many commented on how beautiful they were,” Méabh Bracken told The Irish Catholic.
The project was inspired by an article written by Chiara Lubich, founder of the Focolare movement, who wrote that this “rich world has trapped Christmas and all that goes with it and has evicted Jesus”.