By Lookout Staff

December 2, 2015 -- With a losing court battle firmly behind it, Santa Monica's nativity scenes display will celebrate its 63rd anniversary this year at its new location, Mount Olive Lutheran Church, although organizers said they’ll go back to their longtime home at Palisades Park briefly for opening ceremonies.

Festivities will begin at Palisades Park starting at 3 p.m., Sunday, December 13, along Ocean Avenue at the foot of Arizona Avenue, organizers said.

Opening ceremonies include a recitation of the Christmas story, Christmas carols and the display of a large banner with photos of the Nativity scenes and the scriptures that accompany them, according to the Santa Monica Nativity Scenes Committee.

But the 13 life-size nativity scenes that triggered a court battle will be placed at the Mount Olive Lutheran Church at 1343 Ocean Park Boulevard in Santa Monica. The display will remain through Epiphany on January 6, 2016.

The display starts along Maple Street one block north of Ocean Park Boulevard, west of 14th Street, organizers said. It will end along 14th Street.

A tradition that dates back to the Eisenhower era, the Nativity Scenes at Palisades Park were removed from Palisades Park after the 9th District Court of Appeal upheld Santa Monica’s prohibition of multiple-day displays at all City parks.

Its action was the result of a conflict with a group of atheists that flooded the City with applications to put up its own displays in Palisades Park.

The new signs, some of them satirical, were later vandalized, and the City decided to stop all overnight displays at Palisades Park -- including the Nativity Scenes.

Members of the Nativity Committee went on to sue the City, claiming their constitutional rights to free speech were violated by the ban. The suit was dismissed in November 2012.

Mt. Olive Lutheran Church became the new home for the Nativity Scenes in 2013.

“The Nativity Scenes Committee is deeply grateful to the people of Mount Olive Lutheran Church and Pastor Eric Shafer for providing a home for the Nativity Scenes for the display,” the committee said in a statement this week.

Celebrations at Mount Olive Lutheran Church include an “interfaith Christmas Jazz Vespers” at 5 p.m. on December 13. Then the church will host to a community party in the parking lot at 6:30 p.m. to welcome the Nativity Scenes, organizers said.

To drive by the Nativity Scenes, organizers recommend taking Ocean Park Boulevard, turning north on Euclid (13th), then right on Maple Street to the scenes. At the stop sign, drivers are asked to turn right onto 14th Street.

For those who want to park and then walk the scenes, parking is available in the church parking lot. Enter off 14th Street.