On the lawn of a Claremont church, just like at many churches at this time of year, cutouts of wise men on camelback head toward a makeshift stable, a meager wooden structure where Mary and Joseph have huddled inside. 
 
 But instead of an infant Jesus cradled in his mother's arms, the Nativity at Claremont United Methodist Church — the creation of congregant and artist John Zachary — features a depiction of Trayvon Martin slumped over in his hoodie, a pool of his blood spreading over a bed of straw. 
 
 For several years, Zachary has brought his artistic interpretations of the Nativity — as well as the occasional controversy — to the church, as he used a scene that traditionally conveys themes of joy and innocence to spread messages of social justice. Over the last few years, his installations have touched on homelessness, poverty and acceptance of gay families. 
 
 He decided over the summer that this year's scene would include the Florida teenager whose shooting death captured the nation's attention. Zachary said he wanted to draw a parallel between rampant gun violence and the dark time in which Jesus was born. 
 
 "He was, in my view, an innocent child like the innocent children killed by King Herod," Zachary, 57, said of Martin. "I think the Nativity has to be relevant to our time. I think Jesus is a symbol of hope and I think he has to be seen in today's context." 
 
 But what he sees as a respectful, if provocative, way to stir conversation has others fuming. Ever since the Nativity got national attention last week, when a local newspaper's story went viral, the church has been bombarded with phone calls, emails and Facebook messages. 
 
 The scene, which will remain in place through Jan. 5, has been blasted as "sacrilege" and an "abomination." 
 
 "How sad to replace the Savior in the nativity scene," one person posted on Facebook. "What kind of church is this??? I pray that you will understand the real reason for the season..." 
 
 "No Christian I know would ever disparage Jesus Christ with such a repulsive image," wrote another. "I would never attend your church as a fellow Methodist and you ought to be ashamed of yourselves." 
 
 The Rev. Dan Lewis, a pastor at the church, said he feared many of those complaining had seen only the photographs that had spread online but hadn't read the statement by Zachary on a placard next to it, explaining his vision. The scene was meant to do more than shock people, he said, but instead be thought-provoking. 
 
 "Nothing is done flippantly here," Lewis said. "It's got great thought, great depth and great meaning." 
 
 Lewis said some members of the congregation disagree with the Nativity, and he was hesitant when he first saw Zachary's renderings. Zachary admitted that even he had some doubts. 
 
 "I have had reservations, although I have come to think that it's the right way to do it," he said. "I feel a little sad that some people are so outraged about it." 
 
 Around dusk on Friday, Moni Law pulled up to the scene with her son, Matthew Law-Phipps. Law, a housing counselor in Berkeley, had grown up in Claremont, and when she went back to visit family for Christmas, she would go see Zachary's work. "It pulled at your heart and your mind," she said. 
 
 "God calls us to speak truth to the reality of the world," she said. "Why would we ignore this travesty of justice?" 
 
 Law-Phipps, a 22-year-old Loyola Marymount film student, said he saw something that was more personal than political, and more about violence than race. 
 
 "That is brave," he said. "It's very blatant. Subtlety isn't at work here.… I will say, it got our attention." 
 
 As mother and son stood back, taking in a Nativity scene caked in blood and talking about violence, he figured that's exactly what the artist intended. 
 
 rick.rojas@latimes.com ||||| Nativity scenes have a few standard elements: a manger, swaddling clothes, happy parents, sheep, maybe the Three Wise Men. They don’t generally include Trayvon Martin. 
 
 But there he is, wearing a hoodie, a stream of blood pouring from his chest onto the straw-covered floor of the scene outside Claremont United Methodist Church, the holy family around him. 
 
 There is danger in the manger. 
 
 For the seventh straight Christmas, the church at 211 W. Foothill Blvd. has turned its Nativity display into a piece of art that comments on our times. 
 
 John Zachary, the artist, told me the acquittal in July of George Zimmerman, who fatally shot the 17-year-old African-American in 2012, struck him as a worthy subject for Christmas comment. 
 
 For one thing, the backdrop to the Christmas story is the slaughter by King Herod of all infants in Bethlehem, a barbarous attempt to kill the Messiah. 
 
 Rather than tidings of comfort and joy, that time of year would have seen “other parents in agony because their children had just been killed,” a plaque explains. 
 
 In searching for photos of Trayvon, Zachary said one of the teenager lying dead on the pavement particularly tore at him. 
 
 “What if Jesus was lying there bleeding to death? I was kind of thinking of that,” Zachary said. 
 
 The scene is titled “A Child is Born, a Son is Given,” the wording outlined in red formed from a pool of blood at Trayvon’s feet. I suggested to Zachary that he might be melding Christ’s birth and Crucifixion in one tableau, Easter being the time a son was given. 
 
 “Easter and Christmas should be tied together. It’s all the same story,” Zachary said. 
 
 Of course, via his substitution, we might ask the question, Did Trayvon Martin die for our sins? Depending on your politics, the answer might be yes. But let’s not get too philosophical here. 
 
 In contrast to the serene approach of most Nativity scenes, Zachary and Claremont United Methodist aim, year after year, to remind us forcibly that Joseph and Mary were outsiders. 
 
 “I think the value of this is that it stretches us to think, what does the birth of Christ call us to do?” Sharon Rhodes-Wickett, the church’s lead pastor, told me. But even she admits the violence of the scene is unsettling. 
 
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 “I found this year’s hard to look at. It’s hard to look at a young man who’s shot and bleeding to death. But even though I’m uncomfortable with it, that’s the point,” Rhodes-Wickett said. “We have to take a look at the violence.” 
 
 Zachary and I met up Monday morning at the Nativity, where he was making a few repairs. 
 
 Even if this was an articulated dummy in street clothes and hooded sweatshirt, it was almost painful to watch the artist using a drill on Trayvon Martin’s forearm. Hadn’t the teen suffered enough? 
 
 A rod, painted red, between his chest and the floor illustrates a stream of blood. 
 
 Zachary, who was wearing a T-shirt with the famous image of a triumphant Muhammad Ali standing over Sonny Liston in the ring, was cheerful and friendly. He talks with the cadences of his native Tennessee. 
 
 “I grew up in the Methodist church. All my family are Methodist ministers,” said Zachary, who’ll turn 58 on Jan. 2. 
 
 Residents of Claremont, Zachary, his wife and children have been attending Claremont United Methodist for 15 years. He is a Hollywood production designer, who designs, builds and “dresses” sets for TV and movie productions such as “Raising Hope,” a Fox sitcom, and “My Name is Earl,” a former NBC comedy. 
 
 Church leaders approached him in 2007 about creating and building a Nativity. Zachary began planning a typical scene. Then he had second thoughts. 
 
 Christmas traditions of gifts, celebration and warmth reflect “privilege,” Zachary said, and “there’s a lot of people who don’t have that privilege. Maybe I should do something that’s provocative, that’s more in keeping with the teachings of Jesus.” 
 
 That first year, he updated the Nativity concept, making Joseph and Mary a modern homeless couple on a ghetto street. The backdrop was a wall of graffiti. 
 
 “It was appropriate historically. They were homeless refugees,” Zachary noted. “You try to put it in a context of how it would be today.” 
 
 The scene struck a chord in the community. Elementary school students left notes of support, and a shopping cart in the scene was spontaneously filled with grocery items, which the church used for its food bank. 
 
 “It was received very well. From then on I’ve kept it in the contemporary context,” Zachary said. 
 
 His subsequent scenes turned Mary, Joseph and Jesus into war refugees in Iraq, flanked by American soldiers, against a bombed-out wall with the slogan “Peace on Earth” (2008); into Mexican migrants halted by the U.S. border wall (2009); into an African-American woman holding her infant, sans Joseph, in a prison cell (2010); and again (2012) into a homeless couple, outside a chain-link fence that Zachary took down on Christmas Day to show their inclusion. 
 
 2011’s scene skipped the Nativity, instead depicting the outlines of three couples, two of them same-sex, each holding hands, under the wording “Christ is Born.” The figures of the two same-sex couples were later knocked over, which police investigated as a hate crime, although Zachary said "it was probably just kids or something.” 
 
 This year’s scene looks traditional at first glance. Joseph and Mary are in silhouette inside a wooden shelter against a backdrop that resembles stained glass. 
 
 Zachary said: “If you drive by, you think, oh, that’s nice. Then you think, what’s that black kid doing there? So you take a look.” 
 
 The scene went up Dec. 8 and will come down Jan. 5. Response has been muted. 
 
 “I thought this would be more controversial, but I come to find out people don’t really like people gettin’ shot,” Zachary said with a chuckle. “They may not agree what to do about it, but they agree it’s a bad thing.” 
 
 As we spoke in front of the scene, which is along a Foothill frontage road between a bank and a theology school, motorists cruised past for a look. 
 
 Anthony and Gloria Huerta parked and tried to take the scene in. Gloria focused on the angels. Anthony thought Trayvon was a zombie inserted by a prankster. 
 
 Once Zachary explained the scene, the Pomona couple seemed to appreciate his approach. 
 
 “They’re not going to go crazy on you here. It’s Claremont,” Gloria assured him. 
 
 Later, retiree Viola Saunders of La Verne parked and walked up. She didn’t look pleased. “It’s pretty bad,” she remarked. 
 
 Saunders said her friends at Pomona First Baptist Church were buzzing about the scene. “It takes away from the original,” Saunders said before walking back to her car. 
 
 A couple of minutes later, she returned to take photos on her phone. She wasn’t sure they turned out. Zachary politely took down her address and promised to mail her photos. 
 
 “I can see where you’re coming from,” Saunders told him, although she was still of the opinion the Nativity is too sacred to modify. 
 
 Rhodes-Wickett said her congregation, which meets in a sanctuary designed by architect Richard Neutra, is progressive. “Most people like something that makes us think and makes us search our hearts,” she said. 
 
 “Some people think it’s too edgy. I understand that point of view,” she added. “I don’t know what the future will bring, but at this point it’s an annual thing.” 
 
 Zachary said his faith has been deepened by the act of creating the scenes. 
 
 “As I’ve done these, Christmas has become more meaningful to me,” Zachary said. “It’s become deeper — but not so literal.” 
 
 David Allen writes Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, albeit not deeply or meaningfully. Contact david.allen@langnews.com or 909-483-9339, visit insidesocal.com/davidallen, like davidallencolumnist on Facebook and follow @davidallen909 on Twitter.
– Most nativity scenes include three wise men and a stable. The one at Claremont United Methodist Church in California has replaced Jesus with Trayvon Martin wearing a hoodie, his heart pouring blood, the Los Angeles Times reports. "What if Jesus was lying there bleeding to death?" says the artist, John Zachary, reports the Daily Bulletin. "I was kind of thinking of that." A native Tennessean who grew up Methodist, Zachary says he thought the scene would be "more controversial," but learned that people of all political stripes "don’t really like people gettin' shot." Zachary has been building provocative nativity scenes for the Claremont church east of Los Angeles since 2007. His scenes included Jesus and Mary as a modern homeless couple, Iraq war refugees, and Mexican migrants; one depicted an African-American woman cradling Jesus in prison. As for this year's, some reactions have been scathing. "How sad to replace the Savior in the nativity scene," posted one person on Facebook. "What kind of church is this???" But in the Times and Bulletin stories, passersby seem more balanced: "That is brave," said a 22-year-old student. "Subtlety isn't at work here. ... I will say, it got our attention."