A divided village is what country priest Joseph Mohr finds when he arrives at his new parish: a village cut in half by a river that forms a political and more importantly, a social border. Both sides are engaged in a bitter struggle, with the wealthy merchants on the one side trying to break the monopoly of the poor bargemen on the other. Braced by his strong sense of justice, Mohr fights for the rights of the impoverished bargemen. To give them a little comfort and warmth in their darkest moments, he and his friend Franz Xaver Gruber, the schoolteacher in the village, create a song that has become synonymous with Christmas all over the world: "Silent Night, Holy Night"