Not ICE Was Here but Jesus Christ IS Here

 Joseph, Mary and Prenatal Jesus Under Public Governance

 
“In those days, a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled.”  (Luke 2:1-2).  St. Joseph, being from the city of David called Bethlehem, heeded the edict and traveled over ninety miles there with Mary and her unborn child, Jesus.  Was the census “fair”?  Likely not.  For one reasonable protestation, Caesar was a deified emperor—his own god.  Also, the budding Holy Family was compelled to leave the familiarity of Nazareth at a most inconvenient time, eventually reduced to temporary housing in a cave among animals.  By today’s standards, indignant protesters would be storming Caesar’s residence for trampling on the rights of the poor.

 
Yet, St. Joseph obeyed civil authority, and, by his humility, fulfilled God’s will, not his own or some other’s idea of “justice.”

 
Eventually early Christians began honoring the humble birth site of Jesus Christ.  St. Francis in 1223 proposed and arranged a manger of hay in a cave with an ox and donkey and assisted in Mass over the modest display. The December 2025 Magnificat shares an informative article (Anthony Esolen) “Stealing Into Out Humility” that relates that “sacred play.” Since then, Nativity scenes have traditionally and rightfully encouraged devotion to the Birth of Our Savior Jesus Christ and the Holy Family in multiple locations though out the world with some variations.  Moreover despite desecration of the Last Supper and sacrilegious portrayals of the Passion of Christ, the innocent beauty of Our’s Lord’s modest “first home” after birth was preserved.

 
However, in our day and due to the swiftness of social media, even some clergy have fallen into the temptation of “making political statements” transforming the simple straw laden creche into “straw man” arguments.

 
For example, an admonishment from the Archdiocese of Boston, Saint Susanna Parish in Deham, Massachusetts, defended its disfigured Nativity scene that includes a large poster that reads “ICE WAS HERE” and the Baby Jesus in handcuffs.  The pastor and parish essentially rejected the ecclesiastical rebuke.  So, not only a knee bent to the “in crowd,” instead of Jesus, but a “talk to the hand” (politely stated) to Church authority.

 
Such theatrical modernists also disrespect Sacred Scripture and the work of Church Father and Doctors, as well as other holy advisors of the Faith through 2,000 years, who would never have coopted the symbolism of Church history to manipulate this great drama in Church history.  Wise defenders of truth effectively examine issues, including immigration, without resorting to gimmicky displays that undermine sanctity.   Moreover, emotional secular reactivity had no place in the life of Jesus Christ despite the Pharisees and others numerous attempts to entrap Jesus in such tensions often leaned towards rebellion against Rome.

 
Based on Truth, early Church Fathers supported the “natural right to migrate” but in accordance with the Cardinal virtues:  prudence, justice, temperance, and courage.  Countries have the right—authority— to maintain borders and regulate immigration weighing the rights of all its citizens and residents. Immigrants have the duty to respect their host country.   Two strong Church voices on immigration:  Medieval St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Thomas More (mentioned later) balanced charity with justice on this issue, and the principles, albeit imperfectly applied, support  a nation’s right to also protect its citizens against hostile immigrants.

Certainly foolishly allowing streams of massive, chaotic crowds across a nation’s boundaries is bound to cause unjust and intemperate harm to those seeking to preserve life, including, ironically, those aliens who lawfully settled.  

 
Today’s churches should recognize that law and order are required regardless of personal disagreements about how that looks and works, though a matter for discussion and resolutions.  Moreover, had the rebellious cities and states years earlier respected immigration laws developed and enforced by both major political parties, chaotic pursuit of vicious predators that sweep up the less culpable could have been avoided or significantly minimized.  

Ultimately manipulating the Holy Family to jab Americans with propagandized exaggeration about what was a largely preventable, Biden Administration fueled crisis smacks of rendering to Caesar what is not his. Worse, by maligning the Nativity, Saint Susanna and other churches foster rebellion, mob attacks on peaceful officers fulfilling their duty, and unjustly excuse destruction of property.

 
Reverence for the Nativity’s Authentic Message:  Our Savior Has Been Born

 
Thankfully, by the grace of God,  a recent Vatican decision turns us to an uplifting Nativity that refocuses on the beauty and sacredness of life from conception in an apt and wonderful depiction of the Holy Family.  “Nacimiento Gaudium” or “Joyful Birth,” designed by Costa Rican artist Paula Senoto with the help of “Forty Days for Life.”  Prominently placed in Paul VI Audience Hall through Christmas,  Pope Leo blessed it during a December 15 ceremony.  The nativity includes Byzantine iconography with Franciscan figurines.  In place of traditional straw are 28,000 ribbons representing each of the babies saved through prayers and vigilant witness during “40 Days of Life,” an internationally coordinated campaign that aims to end abortion locally through prayer and fasting, community outreach, and peaceful all day vigils in front of abortion businesses.  

 
Pope Leo noted “these works are seeking to unite art and spirituality in a setting that tells the story of the faith and cultural roots of your land.”

 
The Vatican Nativity features an inspiring pregnant Blessed Virgin Mother  until Christmas when that figure will be replaced by a regular statue of Our Lady, reminding everyone that Our Lord was born into the world, as an infant.   This sacredly work also reminds us that our “littlest immigrants” into the world at large, first cross from the “border of the womb.”  

 
Also noteworthy, Pope Leo recently emphasized the urgency in protecting life from conception to natural death.  (This is not a ‘political’ issue open to debate, but a fundamental truth.). Speaking before conservative politicians (European Conservatives and Reformists Group of the European Parliament), as reported December 10, Pope Leo emphasized Europe’s Judeo-Christian roots, the sage example of St. Thomas More, each person’s dignity, and the call to advance the common good.    These coordinated appearances, along with a Nativity display that emphasizes life, underscore the Catholic duty to first protect the most vulnerable among us.  And, until that is firmly established, other rights will be difficult to address, let alone, resolve.

 
Furthermore, while hyper focused on partisan talking points, often skewed, the politicalized clergy has largely failed to provide blunt, distinct focus on the impact of family disintegration worldwide, the unnatural but deadly consequences of artificial birth control and abortion, and the ensuing imbalances that led to the tsunamis of immigration worldwide, not just in the United States, and threaten Christian civilization.

Perhaps St. Mother Teresa voiced this best in a 1994 National Prayer Breakfast in Washington DC.  She recounted that God so loved the world, He gave his son.  Upon conception, Mary made haste to share the good news with her cousin Elizabeth whose own unborn child, John, leapt in her womb with joy.  While speaking of the needs of the poor, this gentle, self sacrificing nun, alluded to “many people…very, very concerned with the children of India…Africa…the violence in the great country of the United States…(very good)…but often these same people are not concerned with the millions that are being killed by the deliberate decision of mothers.”  (Fathers are dismissed from their responsibility, too.)

 
Mother Teresa continued,  “This is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today—abortion which brings people to such blindness.”  Mother Teresa continued that this (abortion) was the direct killing of an innocent child, murder by the mother.  She exhorted the audience:  Let us bring the child back to the center of our care and concern.”  (catholicnewsagency.com “Blessed Mother Teresa on Abortion”). We can see that her words were prophetic, and we are in deeper warfare today having not followed her loving wisdom.  (The plight of the hundreds of thousands of trafficked immigrant children is another tragic consideration.)

 
The Nativity scene must always bring our singular focus back to The Child, The Babe, Our Lord Jesus Christ, center of our lives.

 
To the Pastor of St. Susanna Church:  “Free the Divine Hands of the Babe Jesus, so He may posture in a blessing for our wounded world.  Illuminate the Virgin Mary and her most chaste, protective spouse, St. Joseph.  Take down the sign about ICE (was here) and proclaim from the pulpit:  

 
Jesus IS here!