(Michael Stack | Special to The Tribune) Grotto in the Church of the Nativity, where Christians believe Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem. April 2022.

Beloved Baby Jesus, this Christmas I come to You with a heart full of uncertainty, with wounds I long for You to heal and tears only You can console. You, who were born in the humility of a manger ...

It’s about divine limitation, humility, and weakness. A crying, unsettled Jesus who soiled himself like any other baby captures the central miracle that Christmas proposes.

The death of Jesus is stunning, too—the humility of God again fully on display, but under the most brutal and savage of circumstances. Consider the prophetic description in Isaiah 50:6–7: ...

St. Cajetan, canonized in 1671, is often depicted in art holding the Infant Jesus, as is St. Anthony of Padua, who also had a mystical experience involving the Christ Child.

In the drummer boy’s state of pure humility, he gains the approval of not only the mother of God (“Mary nodded”) but of the baby Jesus as well (“Then He smiled at me”).

Throughout his papacy, Francis went there to pray to an icon of the Virgin Mary holding baby Jesus. In death, he'll lie in a simple tomb beside her chapel. NPR's Ruth Sherlock takes us there.

St. Cajetan, canonized in 1671, is often depicted in art holding the infant Jesus, as is St. Anthony of Padua, who also had a mystical experience involving the Christ Child.