A Christmas grinch has been stealing Baby Jesuses from New Jersey nativities and police are fed up.
A Morris County woman reported that the infant in her nativity, valued at $80, had been stolen, just one of multiple incidents of Baby Jesus theft in the same area this year and last, The Daily Record reports. Police are still searching for the thief.
Last year, two baby Jesus nativity pieces were stolen in the area. One of those was recovered, and one was paid for by a neighbor wishing to spread a little Christmas cheer.
“It’s a Christmas miracle,” Elaine Romito, the woman whose statue was replaced, told The Daily Record. “They only gave us their first names and said they lived nearby. The father’s name was Alex and the son, who looked like a teenager, maybe 16, was named Brian. They asked if we were the family who lost our Baby Jesus. When we said they were, they asked if they could replace it.”
But Christmas theft has gone both ways this year. The American Humanist Association has complained that their anti-God signs, which the group puts up regularly in court houses to contrast nativity displays, have been the victim of multiple thefts.
The sign reads:
At this season of the Winter Solstice, may reason prevail.
There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell.
There is only our natural world.
Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds.
“FFRF is no stranger to vandalism and theft,” FFRF Staff Attorney Sam Grover said in a statement. “We have been dealing with this sort of censorship for decades. Last winter one of our Winter Solstice signs was vandalized in Arlington Heights, Illinois and in March our ‘In Reason We Trust’ sign was stolen from the Wisconsin Capitol rotunda.”
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