TUNBRIDGE, Vt. (WCAX) – Authorities are investigating a crime that targeted an Upper Valley Church’s holiday display. For decades, the Tunbridge Church has put up a Nativity scene for the holidays, but officials say this past week, it went missing.
“I was pretty stunned by it and pretty disappointed,” said Pastor John McClintock with the Tunbridge Church, which is loosely affiliated with the United Church of Christ.
There is a noticeable void on Main Street in Tunbridge — the empty crèche that usually displays statues of Mary, Joseph, animals, and the baby Jesus. For faithful Christians, that is what Christmas is really all about. “The moment where God becomes flesh, God becomes a person,” McClintock said. “This is a world where bad things sometimes happen.”
However, sometime this week, all of the statues vanished overnight.
“When you listen to all the stories about things being taken, you know breaking in and stuff, I guess that’s not a surprise, but this seemed sort of odd,” said church member Nancy Chapman, who grew up in Tunbridge. She says the theft is actually an attack on religious beliefs. “Our hope is that they suddenly appear back here someplace, even if it’s behind the parish house and just left here.”
And if that happens, parishioners say they would gladly turn the other cheek. “You know, I take forgiveness very seriously,” McClintock said.
The Windsor County Sheriff’s Department is investigating. Anyone with information is asked to give them a call.