Last night, at my Maryon family party, my extended family put on our Nativity play. This play has been a part of our family since my father was a child. My Grandma Pat wrote the script and it includes Christmas songs and hymns, and scripture passages from the Book of Mormon as well as the Bible. We have performed the very same thing year after year. When I was growing up, I was an angel with a halo of gold tinsel and a white sheet draped around me. Once or twice I got to play Mary, and in later years, I played the piano accompaniment or read some of the narration.
This year, Tim and I were asked to play Joseph and Mary. We were being a little silly as we put on costumes and as I tried to swaddle the baby doll that was Jesus. But when it came time to walk across the room and kneel together around the blanketed infant, the story took shape and reality. My cousins knelt around us, my aunts and uncles read lines of scripture, and together we sang joy and praise.
My cousins and I are growing up, growing a little old to dress up, but this is a tradition that I know we'll carry on. Eventually we'll have our own children and they will be forced to dress up as angels and shepherds and wisemen. There is something beautiful about sharing a tradition with family, especially one that celebrates something as holy and joyful as the birth of our Savior. We may roll our eyes a little at the production, but in our hearts, we love taking part in this Christmas pageant every year.
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