Angelic four-year-olds in their oversized white t-shirts and tinsel halos. An errant two-year-old sheep who tries to abscond with baby Jesus. The solemn and oh-so-grown-up Virgin Mary played by a newly-minted ten-year-old. Parents vying for the perfect picture for the family newsletter.

Ah, yes, the annual church Christmas pageant. We’ve witnessed it in all its glory, and many of us have had our moment in the spotlight as a shepherd wearing a dish towel on our head or as the back half of a camel. Christmas pageants are about as old as the event they portray. While they can be simple, like a small group of children in bathrobes and flip flops, or an elaborate, full-on production, in the end, they’re all pretty much the same year after year.

Shifting from Performance to Collective Retelling

What most Christmas pageants have in common is this: More often than not, they are a spectator sport. The children—and sometimes a few adults in a pinch—put on the performance, and the audience takes it in. Then we head to the parish hall for cookies and punch. It’s tradition. It’s the way we’ve always done it.

But picture with me, if you will, a different scene: Mary is a 60-year-old man, Joseph is wearing a baseball cap that says, “World’s 2^nd Best Dad,” baby Jesus is a college student, and even the animals have “speaking parts.” This is the joyful chaos of the Paper Bag Pageant.

How It Works

The idea is simple enough and can be done on any budget with any group. As participants arrive, they encounter a table covered in sealed paper bags and instructions to take one. Each bag contains a costume of sorts, a prop or two, and a highlighted copy of the script. Participants are instructed to carefully open their bags, remove the script, and look it over so they’re ready for their theatrical debuts. The most important instruction of all is this: Don’t tell anyone whom you’re playing!

Once everyone is gathered in a circle, the narrator begins to tell the story of the Nativity from the beloved passages in Matthew and Luke. As characters in the story are mentioned, the persons playing them remove their costumes and props from the bag, finally revealing that the angel Gabriel is a 79-year-old retired professor and Mary is the Senior Warden!

A Fully Participatory, Intergenerational Event

The Paper Bag Pageant provides a unique opportunity for the whole congregation to participate instead of sitting as passive observers. Everyone gets to play a part, whether by picking a bag and portraying a character, by joining the active audience responding to the cue cards, or simply with their presence in the circle. The story is told faithfully (with some commentary added for fun), and the memories last long after the final notes of “Joy to the World” fade away. We celebrated the Second Sunday of Advent last year with the Paper Bag Pageant, and parishioners are still talking about it, asking if we’ll do it again this year.

This is truly an intergenerational event. It brings the entire congregation together to prepare our hearts for the celebration of Christmas as we retell the sacred story that reminds us of our God who took on our humanity, came to earth for us, lived with us, and yes, laughed with us.

That first Christmas could only have been a night of joyful chaos. Our annual Christmas pageants can be too!

Paper Bag Pageant Script

Here is a PDF of the script that we used in 2025: Paper Bag Christmas Pageant Script

Editor’s Note: When using or sharing this script, please give credit to the article author.

Featured image and additional photos are by article author, Amy Ickes