Pastor continues father’s storytelling legacy: Pilgrim Press publishes “The Salamander at the Manger”

Saint Francis of Assisi might have introduced to the world the first Christmas nativity — presenting the birth of Christ tableau in Greccio, Italy in 1223 — but it is the Rev. Evelyn Robbennolt-Jones who enriches the scene with an unsuspecting guest amid the usual stable suspects: a salamander.

In her newly released book by Pilgrim Press, The Salamander at the Manger: Animal Stories of the Holy Night, Robbennolt-Jones, an ordained United Church of Christ pastor, uses the color-changing amphibian to tell the heartwarming message of radical welcome and belonging.

“Salamanders illustrate what it means to be who you are and not to be afraid of showing your true colors to the world,” said Robbennolt-Jones.

Robbennolt-Jones was inspired to tell the tale of the holy night from the salamander’s perspective from both her home and work life.

The newly minted author’s daughter, Grimmie — a name derived from the Brothers Grimm, who collected and told German folklore that evolved into treasured fairytales — is transgender and has shown Robbennolt-Jones what it means to authentically and fearlessly live in one’s skin.

Robbennolt-Jones has also spent the last ten years as a licensed clinical social worker at Weeks Medical Center, Lancaster, New Hampshire, working with and developing meaningful connections with members of the LGTBQ community.

A family legacy continues

Giving a voice to God’s beloved creations just felt like the right message to give the world in 2025, she observed. A message her late father, the Rev. Roger L. Robbennolt, would have been proud of, and the very message he himself told many a Christmas season. In 1996, Pilgrim Press published Robbennolt’s stories in The Unicorn at the Manger.

“For years I would share my dad’s stories from that book, but when I ran out of stories, I had to start writing my own material,” said Robbennolt-Jones. So well received were her “at the manger” stories, that her spouse urged her to publish them.

“People tend to encourage you to publish, but you never actively pursue it,” she said.

Last year, though, while at a Pilgrims Press writer’s workshop, The Salamander at the Manger was embraced as a sequel to the unicorn’s tale.

“Pilgrim Press wanted to publish it,” said Robbennolt-Jones, who just so happened to have found the time to complete the manuscript due to knee surgery last summer.

While writing, Robbennolt-Jones not only had the legacy of her father in her heart. She had his actual muse: the unicorn figurine.

Her father began his book thanks to a parishioner who wanted to make a creche one year for the church he was serving in Washington. In the creche was a unicorn. A gifted storyteller, Robbennolt-Jones’ father didn’t miss a beat and delivered a spur of the moment children’s message about how the unicorn was at the manger.

“Each year after that my father would get a new animal wrapped in paper to open and improv a story,” she recalled.

As for Robbennolt-Jones, she will continue to add new animals to the manger, crafting endearing stories of how they have the honor to gaze upon the holy child. For now, though, her hopes for The Salamander at the Manger is that people will buy and read it. She hopes that people will remember how important telling stories are, for in the telling comes hope and light into the world.

“And that is the story of the birth of Christ — hope and light born into the world, and because of that everyone has a place at the manger,” said Robbennolt-Jones.

Even a salamander.

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