Annual Kilkenny crib walk returns this Christmas

The Annual Church Christmas Crib Walk will take place on St Stephens Day in Kilkenny City, beginning at the Friary Church from 11am.

This year marks the 21st scheduling of the walk locally. Participants will join the community of Bethlehem who celebrate Holy Crib Day on St Stephens Day as walkers and pilgrims gather to ask for health and happiness for the year ahead as they make their pilgrim way through life. 

Fr Willie Purcell will lead the event and told Kilkenny Live: "It is great to join with our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land who like us in Kilkenny will make the pilgrim walk of the cribs of the shrines in the Holy Land, this is something we have been doing for years but this year adds a special dimension to the event."

The annual Crib Walk of the Churches in Kilkenny is a reflective walk on the meaning and traditions of church cribs in Kilkenny.  Each Church has its own tradition in its Christmas Crib and its design and structure often reflect not only the community of the present, but the communities of the generations gone before who formed and built the various church cribs.