According to the World Health Organization, there are over 200 million stray dogs roaming the earth at any given time.

The homeless pet population has grown exponentially over the last few decades and because of this, seeing a stray dog or cat is simply commonplace. But that doesn’t mean it’s okay.

Every night, these pets are searching for a warm, safe place to sleep. When the winter hits, though, this can become even harder to do. All of their normal hideouts are too frigid to sleep in, and if they don’t find shelter they can easily freeze to death.

That is exactly what one stray puppy was facing when he came up with a brilliant solution.

In the frozen Brazil winter of 2008, a stray puppy from Criciúma was desperately seeking shelter.

It was around Christmastime, and while many business owners or Good Samaritans will take a stray in for the night if they see them, not all stray animals are so lucky.

Thankfully, this stray puppy found shelter in the most fitting of places, the city’s nativity scene.

Amongst all of the plastic animals, angels, and wise men, the stray puppy blended right in. It’s doubtful that he would have ever been discovered had it not been for a few passersby stopping to admire the pretty nativity scene. As their gaze wandered from one figure to the next, they suddenly noticed the cold puppy cuddled up to the “baby Jesus” tucked into the manger.

The perfect sanctuary.

Considering that Mary and Joseph were seeking a place of refuge to give birth to their sacred child and found none, it seems like there is no place more perfect to seek sanctuary than in the nativity scene. We only pray that the sweet stray puppy was blessed enough to find a forever home among the group of adoring onlookers.

Rather than shooing the stray puppy away from the nativity display, the city residents gathered all around him.

While the German shepherd puppy looked a little startled at the crowd of people huddled around him, he didn’t let it scare him away. He knew he was safe in the arms of the nativity’s baby Jesus, and he wasn’t going anywhere.

Of course, onlookers couldn’t resist the urge to snap a few photos of the precious scene before them.

As anyone would expect, they soon went insanely viral. Since then, they have been shared across the internet every year around Christmastime, often as a reminder to have compassion on all our friends, furry and otherwise, during the harsh winter months.

Unlike some people, stray animals don’t get to choose whether or not to sleep in the streets.

That’s not to say that people without shelter aren’t equally important, but they do have more options. They can seek help from friends, family, and homeless shelters. The fate of stray animals, however, depends strictly on the compassion of people.

If by chance they don’t find someone willing to help them, they spend the night in the freezing cold at best or die from the extremes of it at worst.

Thankfully, there are people out there with a compassionate heart for a stray.

One such example of this comes to us from a coffee house in Mytilene, Lesbos, out of Greece.

When the shop is closed down for the night, the employees bring stray dogs into the restaurant so they have a warm, safe place to sleep for the night. There, they can stay cozy in the heated shop while they lounge on the luxuriously cushioned booth benches.

One man from Athens, Bill McMillian, explained the custom during an interview about Life With Dogs:

“Here in Greece our homes are not large enough for all of us to house animals. That’s why we look after the street dogs. We feed them, pet them, and play with them. They are like our own pets, but they belong to everyone instead.“

A beautiful sentiment we wish the whole world could share.

We hope that all strays find some measure of the same compassion this winter because Lord knows, they deserve it. To see more about the stray puppy who found sanctuary in the arms of a baby Jesus doll tucked away in the manger of a Brazil nativity scene, watch the video below.

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H/T: The German Shepherd Dog Community