{"id":39277,"date":"2025-11-20T04:37:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T04:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/39277\/"},"modified":"2025-11-20T04:37:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T04:37:10","slug":"o-little-town-of-bethlehem-returns-to-a-la-crosse-lutheran-church-in-december","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/39277\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;O Little Town of Bethlehem&#8221; returns to a La Crosse Lutheran church in December"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One La Crosse church is getting ready for a Christmas holiday exhibit that doesn\u2019t happen every year.<\/p>\n<p>Members of English Lutheran Church on King Street are preparing scenery and props, and rehearsing for \u2018The Bethlehem Event,\u201d recreating what Bethlehem would have been like at the time Jesus was born. About 200 people work on the live display inside the church, that can be seen on December 13th and 14th. <\/p>\n<p>Pam Strittmater is coordinating the production, which has involved five generations of her family over almost 50 years, dating back to the first presentation in 1978, which included her grandmother.  <\/p>\n<p>When visitors arrive at the indoor representation of Bethlehem, Strittmater says live animals will be seen and heard throughout the village.  \u201cThey\u2019ll hear the chickens crowing, they\u2019ll hear the donkey, they\u2019ll hear the goats, they\u2019ll hear people in the courtyard, talking about this wonderful star\u201d over a manger, she says.  Actors playing Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus will be located inside a cave, which is part of the scene.  <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"771\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/well-and-village-1024x771.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-114171\"  \/>A well and a courtyard will be part of the Bethlehem scene.<\/p>\n<p>Mary Fitzpatrick also is among those dozens of volunteers, and she\u2019ll be on scene selling jewelry amid the sights and sounds of the village.  \u201cWe make jewelry, little bracelets and necklaces and things for the people who come to visit, and go by my shop,\u201d says Fitzpatrick.  She says she has taken part in the last four or five village enactments at English Lutheran.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"771\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/tall-camel-1024x771.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-114172\"  \/>A business called the \u201cTall Camel\u201d also is part of the street scene.<\/p>\n<p>Because of all the preparation needed for the event, the recreation of Bethlehem is usually put on once every four years.  Visitors to the event must register to attend through the church website.<\/p>\n<p>www.englishlutheran.org.<\/p>\n<p>Like this:<\/p>\n<p>Like Loading&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"sd-link-color\"\/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One La Crosse church is getting ready for a Christmas holiday exhibit that doesn\u2019t happen every year. Members&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":["post-39277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}