Roy Donovan: We need a new kind of Crib…

We need a new kind of Crib?

Scholars tell us that the nativity scene in the Matthew and Luke infancy narratives is not historical but religious myth/stories to convey that God is doing something extraordinary new in the coming of God’s son into our world.
The nativity scene as we have it in most churches and elsewhere is a male/patriarchal construction – there is only one woman in it. If women had put together the infancy narratives wouldn’t it give rise to a different kind of imagination/crib?
Don’t we need a new crib face with more female presences? Couldn’t the wise ones be women? Maybe Mary had a sister with her? Maybe a mid-wife helped out? Was Joseph really the mid-wife?

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Who is listened to?

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Brendan Hoban writing in the Western People argues that as long as Bishops don’t listen to people and priests “we (as church) relegate ourselves to the sidelines because we present ourselves as controlling and demanding, refusing to listen or engage with the issue.”
Brendan also suggests that there is a crying need for competent church people to be used to communicate effectively with media and public. “Not every bishop is blessed with the ability to think on his feet or to manage the combination of words that does justice to what he wants to say.”

3 Comments

  1. Phil+Dunne says:

    I always have a second female figure in my crib. I tell my grandchildren she is the midwife, ‘the lady who helped Mary’.

    Reply
  3. Colm Holmes says:

    The 15th Century Book of Hours from Besançon in France (held by the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge) shows Mary reading a book while Joseph looks after Jesus.

    Reply

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