made in china

today I was working at my new job within my place of employment... and part of that is pricing christmas merchandise. one of the sets of merchandise that I happened to be pricing today was 6 piece nativity sets. They were porcelain or ceramic and actually quite tastefully done. As I was pulling each one out of the styrofoam, unwrapping it, and putting a price sticker on the bottom I noticed a little sticker on each that I would normally pay no attention to. It read "Made in China".

I started thinking about that. The fact that I was pricing something made in China was not unusual. A lot of the merchandise that our store sells is made in China, I mean come on - what store doesn't? (I know there are exceptions like the Made in Washington store) However, it was the combination of what the items were and where they were made is what threw me. it seemed quite ironic to me. here I was pricing Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus (and three wise men) all of which are strong symbols of Christianity and they were made in a country by people who are not allowed to practice Christianity. It comes down to this apparently: the Chinese government refuses for any person to be a Christian, but allow their people to produce symbols of Christianity to sell. What I wondered, is what the workers are thinking that actually produce this merchandise... do they ever think about the irony?