Above the village of Greccio, in the wooded hills of the Rieti Valley (about halfway between Assisi and Rome), on Christmas Eve 1223, Saint Francis combined Christmas mass with a nativity scene. There is a special feature in some depictions of this Christmas event: the baby Jesus is not lying in the manger or in his mother's lap, but is being held by Francis.
Even if Francis is often referred to as the founder of the European nativity scene tradition, there have also been nativity scenes before. But what was important for him was the living representation of that event – actually incomprehensible to the intellect – that the great, infinite God became man. San Francesco connects the divine childhood of Jesus with the celebration of the Eucharist, in which the living God gives himself to us again - this time in the form of bread and wine.
"We have come to worship HIM" - that was the motto of the XX. World Youth Day celebrated in Cologne in August 2005. Every Christmas picture, every nativity scene invites the viewer to follow this motto and to do the same as the Three Kings (the first pilgrims to Christ), Francis of Assisi and all the saints.