For the last few years, St Nicholas Church in Warndon has gone out under the cover of darkness at the beginning of December to leave small, knitted gifts around the local community for people to pick up the following morning.
This year, they knitted around 550 baby Jesus’, which were also joined by 250 wooden baby Jesus ornaments.
Vicar, Diane Cooksey said: “Earlier in the year, we had to cut back our Yew Tree as it had split because it was diseased, so we sliced and re-purposed some of the branches to make decorations.
In all around 800 baby Jesus’s were hung on trees and other places in Warndon Villages on the night of Sun 4 December after they were blessed in a special St Nicholas service. We have received some lovely messages of thanks for these with some people commenting on how blessed they felt to find one.”
Each baby Jesus included a message for the person who found it, offering prayers and blessings from the church, a reminder that Jesus is always with us, and encouraging them to take baby Jesus home, or to give it to someone who is in need of prayers at the moment. There was also a link to St Nicholas’ Facebook page where people could find details of the Christmas services.
