{"id":834,"date":"2019-12-11T14:58:29","date_gmt":"2019-12-11T19:58:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?p=834"},"modified":"2019-12-11T14:58:29","modified_gmt":"2019-12-11T19:58:29","slug":"california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html","title":{"rendered":"California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Cages"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_843\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-843\" style=\"width: 700px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-843\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2019\/12\/nativity-in-cages_credit-Mary-Lynn-Strand-Shutterstock.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"525\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-843\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mary Lynn Strand\/Shutterstock.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The image is jarring.<\/p>\n<p>A California congregation\u2019s display depicting the Holy Family in cages, separated at the border in protest to the U.S. immigration policy, is sparking controversy.<\/p>\n<p>The focus of the protest is the Trump Administration policy that ended last year that separated children from families who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.<\/p>\n<p>The church hopes to show people \u201cHow they may have been treated if captured at the U.S.-Mexico border.<\/p>\n<p>Karen Clark Ristine, the senior minister at Claremont United Methodist Church asked on Facebook, \u201cWhat would happen if the family sought refuge in America today?\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe style=\"border: none; overflow: hidden;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fkaren.clark.ristine%2Fposts%2F10162927708070314&amp;width=500\" width=\"500\" height=\"558\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>She then writes that Jesus\u2019 family fled Israel for Egypt soon after his birth to escape King Herod\u2019s coming terror.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn a time in our country when refugee families seek asylum at our borders and are unwillingly separated from one another, we consider the most well-known refugee family in the world. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, the Holy Family,\u201d Ristine said.<\/p>\n<p>She followed up by saying, \u201cImagine Joseph and Mary separated at the border and Jesus no older than two taken from his mother and placed behind the fences of a Border Patrol detention center as more than 5,500 children have been the past three years.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ristine said she was \u201cstirred to tears\u201d by the nativity which had been in the planning stages since she first arrived at the congregation in July.<\/p>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t long before Ristine\u2019s post went viral. The post has been shared over 24,000 times.<\/p>\n<p>While the Holy Family is separated outside of the church, they are reunited in another traditional nativity inside the church where church members and guests can see the family reunited.<\/p>\n<p>Reactions to the nativity display have been mixed. While some people believe that it is a powerful statement of the plight of refugees and asylum seekers, others are not happy seeing the nativity turning into a political statement.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The image is jarring. A California congregation\u2019s display depicting the Holy Family in cages, separated at the border in protest to the U.S. immigration policy, is sparking controversy. The focus of the protest is the Trump Administration policy that ended last year that separated children from families who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally. The church&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":565,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Cages<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Cages\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The image is jarring. A California congregation\u2019s display depicting the Holy Family in cages, separated at the border in protest to the U.S. immigration policy, is sparking controversy. The focus of the protest is the Trump Administration policy that ended last year that separated children from families who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally. The church&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christ News Today\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-12-11T19:58:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2019\/12\/nativity-in-cages_credit-Mary-Lynn-Strand-Shutterstock.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"700\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"525\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Lesli White\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Cages","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in Cages","og_description":"The image is jarring. A California congregation\u2019s display depicting the Holy Family in cages, separated at the border in protest to the U.S. immigration policy, is sparking controversy. The focus of the protest is the Trump Administration policy that ended last year that separated children from families who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally. The church&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html","og_site_name":"Christ News Today","article_published_time":"2019-12-11T19:58:29+00:00","og_image":[{"width":700,"height":525,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2019\/12\/nativity-in-cages_credit-Mary-Lynn-Strand-Shutterstock.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Lesli White","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2019\/12\/california-church-nativity-scene-puts-jesus-mary-and-joseph-in-cages.html","name":"California Church Nativity Scene Puts Jesus, Mary and Joseph in 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