How did we get from this...
to this in less than 5 years?
Can you even make out the figures of Mary, Joseph and the Christ Child in this travesty of the Nativity scene?
Facebook rejects photo of Vatican Nativity
scene for being ‘sexually provocative’
This is bullshit, of course, from Facebook, which has allowed postings of suicides in progress and all sorts of ‘sexting’ with photos. The only reason to reject the photo in question is its bad taste and blasphemous inclusion in the Nativity scene, not to mention its general ugliness… but to ban it from Facebook when it is already on as many sites as have taken an interest in it is just stupid. BTW, the approval of this travesty and exercise in bad taste by the pope himself says it all...
ROME, December 15, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) — Facebook has nixed a photo of this year’s Vatican nativity scene, referencing its policy against “sexually suggestive or provocative” images, Breitbart reported.
The Vatican crèche was donated by the ancient Abbey of Montevergine in the Campania region of southern Italy. Its scenery and crib figures, in 18th-century Neapolitan costumes, were produced by artisans in a local workshop. It incorporates vignettes representing the corporal works of mercy, including visiting the sick and imprisoned, burying the dead, and clothing the naked.
“It was this last element that excited the censors at Facebook,” Breitbart said. The manger scene prominently features the figure of a naked man lying on the straw, being offered a cloth by a pilgrim, just opposite where the figure of the baby Jesus will be placed on Christmas Day.
An ad featuring the image of the scene was rejected by Facebook with the following explanation: “Your ad can’t include images that are sexually suggestive or provocative.”
Veteran Vatican journalist Edward Pentin first posted the photo on Twitter on December 12. Since then, it has done the rounds on social media and provoked shock and dismay among many Catholics, some calling it “disgusting” and others suggesting the naked man is “too much a poster boy for the local gym to be a man in need of corporeal mercy.”
Yet others commented: “Despite the weeping and gnashing, the Vatican presepe is doing in traditional Neapolitan style, with somewhat grotesque figures and t
he crib hidden amongst worldly hustle and bustle, and intentional anachronisms. Depicting the corporal works of mercy is a nice touch.”
The artist behind this year’s Vatican Nativity scene, Antonio Cantone, appeared to suggest that he intended it to be provocative.
“It is not a campy nativity; it is particular and makes you think,” he said. “It leaves no one indifferent; there are provocations.”
In his explanation of the creche at its December 7 inauguration, Pope Francis said:
“This year’s Nativity scene, executed in the typical style of Neapolitan art, is inspired by the works of mercy. They remind us that the Lord has told us: ‘Whatever you wish men to do to you, you also do to them’ (Mt 7.12). The crib is the suggestive place where we contemplate Jesus who, taking upon himself the miseries of man, invites us to do likewise, through acts of mercy.”
There you have it - the imprimatur for this travesty from the mouth of the pope himself! If this pope really wanted his personal message of 'mercy' propagandized through the Vatican Nativity scene, surely a genuinely Catholic artist would have known how to depict the corporal works of mercy as somehow related to the message of Christ but without intruding into the Nativity scene itself. Not this blatant and blasphemous incorporation which deliberately overshadows and makes incidental the event it is supposed to commemorate... Given that the pope approved it all, then the words of censure below from this Spanish commentator surely apply to him and not just to the artist who executed it...
Creche of darkness
by Carlos Maria Rey
Translated from
ADELANTE LA FE
December 14, 2017
'Clothe the naked', 'bury the dead', 'visit the imprisoned' - from the 7 Corporal works of mercy. I think the more relevant 'work of mercy' to apply to this whole travesty
is the first spiritual work of mercy: 'Instruct the ignorant'.
They have mounted the Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square. But it’s a creche of darkness that prominently features a dead man
and a naked man. What are these two figures doing in a Nativity scene? What twisted minds are behind this profanation of
the birth of Christ, Son of God?
And this offensive and blasphemous ‘Nativity scene’ is found no less than in the very heart of Christendom. We have here
an example of the ‘new evangelization’ which waves the standards of blasphemy, sacrilege and apostasy.
This is a farcical creche.
It is offensive and blasphemous.
It totally departs from Tradition.
It brings on a nightmare that deprives one of sleep.
It is totally lacking in tenderness.
It is the fruit of some twisted foul minds.
It is inspired by Satan himself.
It [seeks to] destroy the truth of the Catholic faith.
It offends the most intimate Catholic sensibility.
It is ugly and tasteless – run away from it!
It depicts a false scenario to confuse the beholder and lead him to error.
It deserves to be rejected by the faithful of the universal Church.
We have here a work of the human mind, one that is devoid of the Catholic faith. The twisted mind of a smart-alecky mocker,
a charlatan and a drunk, sacrilegious and perverted. It is the mind of someone who profanes the sacred, who laughs at the
unchangeable faith of tradition. It is the mind of someone who plays at being god and imposes his miserable ideas as a cult
of belief.
Where is the joy of the season when there is a corpse on the scene?
Where is the immaculate purity of the Nativity ith the presence of a naked man?
Where is the mystery of the Incarnation?
Where is the mystery of Christ’s mission of Redemption?
God became man to redeem man from sin.
Where in this Nativity scene do we find modesty, innocence, purity, chastity, and the honesty that underlies the depiction
of the birth of Christ?
This is an inadmissible offense to the foundations of our faith.
We should all inundate the Vatican with letters and e-mails expressing our repulsion for this offense against the Christ Child,
against the purity of Mary and the chastity of St. Joseph.
We cannot go on being silent. Our faith is being offended by the Vatican itself. The mud that soils the face of the Church
comes down from the very head of the Church.
Let us get moving, but not to support heresy and sacrilege, but to oppose these as much as we can.
Let us begin by addressing our most vigorous objections to the Vatican and to the papal nuncio to each country.
We Catholics say: ENOUGH! STOP OFFENDING OUR FAITH!
Did Bergoglio ever think when he approved this terrible Nativity scene, “What would St. Francis of Assisi think?”, since the Poverello, after all, originated the very idea of
recreating the Nativity scene at Christmastime? I know: Bergoglio would say, “He would have approved – putting all those human objects of the seven corporal works of
mercy in the forefront of the beholder’s consciousness”. If so, why did the Poverello never think – from everything that’s known about his life – to do this with his first
creche in Greccio or ever afterwards?
The story of St. Francis of Assisi
and the first Nativity Scene re-creation,
as told by St. Bonaventure
by Gretchen Filz
December 21, 2016
Nativity scenes have been a popular Advent and Christmas decoration for centuries, and — like most things glorious, time-honored, and holy — it originated with a Catholic saint.
St. Francis of Assisi had a special devotion to the Child Jesus, and he is credited with creating the first nativity scene on Christmas Eve of the year 1223.
It is believed that St. Francis was first inspired by this idea after visiting the historical place of Christ’s birth on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land — the humble stable in a Bethlehem cave. It is likely this event which deepened his devotion to the Child Jesus, who was born into the world in such poverty, humility, and simplicity. In fact, Francis founded his new religious Order to imitate these very virtues.
St. Francis recreated the scene of Christ’s birth in a special ritual and Mass he held inside of a cave in Greccio, Italy, inviting both his fellow friars and the townspeople to join in the celebration.
Later he told a friend why he desired to create the first nativity scene in his town:
I want to do something that will recall the memory of that Child who was born in Bethlehem, to see with bodily eyes the inconveniences of his infancy, how he lay in the manger, and how the ox and ass stood by.
He set up an empty manger (the feeding trough of farm animals which served as Jesus’ crib) inside a cave, and even included a live ox and donkey beside the manger just as it was believed to have happened on that first Christmas night.
Through these visual aids he wanted everyone to impress more deeply into their understanding how Christ came into the world in such poverty and simplicity. This was a typical perspective of St. Francis’ unique charism of simple, poverty-centered spirituality.
It is also said that St. Francis — who was radically devoted to the virtue of evangelical poverty — was inspired to recreate the original nativity scene to overcome the rampant greed and materialism prevalent at that time in Italy.
[If he thought as Bergoglio does, he would have incorporated scenes depicting such greed and materialism in the creche in Greccio!]
St Francis in Greccio, Giotto (1297-1300), Fresco, Basilica of St Francis, Assisi
ST. BONAVENTURE TELLS THE STORY
St. Bonaventure (1221 – 1274), a follower and contemporary of St. Francis, has given us a complete account of the night of the first live nativity scene:
It happened in the third year before his death, that in order to excite the inhabitants of Greccio to commemorate the nativity of the Infant Jesus with great devotion, [St. Francis] determined to keep it with all possible solemnity; and lest he should be accused of lightness or novelty, he asked and obtained the permission of the sovereign Pontiff. Then he prepared a manger, and brought hay, and an ox and an ass to the place appointed.
The brethren were summoned, the people ran together, the forest resounded with their voices, and that venerable night was made glorious by many and brilliant lights and sonorous psalms of praise.”...
The man of God [St. Francis] stood before the manger, full of devotion and piety, bathed in tears and radiant with joy; the Holy Gospel was chanted by Francis, the Levite of Christ. Then he preached to the people around the nativity of the poor King; and being unable to utter His name for the tenderness of His love, He called Him the Babe of Bethlehem.”
The first nativity scene is also associated with an apparition of the Baby Jesus to those gathered with St. Francis on that day. This must have been Jesus’s way of giving his praise and blessing to the nativity scene, which was a novelty in its time and had never been done before.
Again, St. Bonaventure continues the story:
A certain valiant and veracious soldier, Master John of Greccio, who, for the love of Christ, had left the warfare of this world, and become a dear friend of this holy man, affirmed that he beheld an Infant marvellously beautiful, sleeping in the manger, Whom the blessed Father Francis embraced with both his arms, as if he would awake Him from sleep.
This vision of the devout soldier is credible, not only by reason of the sanctity of him that saw it, but by reason of the miracles which afterwards confirmed its truth.
For example of Francis, if it be considered by the world, is doubtless sufficient to excite all hearts which are negligent in the faith of Christ; and the hay of that manger, being preserved by the people, miraculously cured all diseases of cattle, and many other pestilences; God thus in all things glorifying his servant, and witnessing to the great efficacy of his holy prayers by manifest prodigies and miracles.”
THE SPREAD OF THE DEVOTION
St. Francis’s recreation of that first Christmas night was so popular that soon every church in Italy had its own nativity scene. The devotion also spread to private homes, and in modern times even to secular institutions, so much so that it’s now impossible to imagine Christmas without a nativity scene to behold.
Hopefully this story of the first nativity scene will inspire you to see your nativity set as much more than just as a pretty Christmas decoration. It is a historic Catholic tradition and a tool for meditation on the humility, simplicity, and poverty of Christ that he took on, from the moment of his Incarnation, out of his boundless love for his lost sheep.
In all the depictions of St. Francis and his original act of homage on Greccio, the focus was always on the Christ Child and on nothing else... I doubt Pope Bergoglio has even bothered to check out
St. Francis's devotion to the Christ Child, or on anything else about St. Francis other than that he preached poverty...[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/12/2017 04:59]