Notice: Function _load_textdomain_just_in_time was called incorrectly. Translation loading for the health-check domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /nas/content/live/brownpelican/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6121

Notice: Function _load_textdomain_just_in_time was called incorrectly. Translation loading for the mfn-opts domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /nas/content/live/brownpelican/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6121
‘A Light in the Darkness’: Bethlehem Plans Joyous Christmas to Offer Hope in the Holy Land, by Michele Chabin – Brown Pelican Society of Lousiana

‘A Light in the Darkness’: Bethlehem Plans Joyous Christmas to Offer Hope in the Holy Land, by Michele Chabin

Pope Leo XIV Suggests Leaders Should Discourage Migration in Lebanon Speech: Building Homeland ‘Very Valuable’, by Frances Martel

December 2, 2025

Fr. Jerry Pokorsky: We Know Not the Day nor the Hour — If You Get My Drift

December 2, 2025

Greyson Joralemon. Unsplash. Manger. Jesus

By Michele Chabin, National Catholic Register, December 2, 2025

Michele Chabin is the Register’s Middle East correspondent. She writes from Jerusalem.

Five Years After COVID’s and War’s Ravages, Site of the Nativity Plans Hopeful Celebration

JERUSALEM — Following two years of subdued Christmas celebrations due to the ongoing Hamas-Israel war, this year the holiday will be celebrated in the Holy Land in all its splendor, especially in Bethlehem.

“The tree is already up and employees are working 24 hours a day to prepare for Christmas,” Bethlehem Deputy Mayor Lucy Talgieh told the Register. “After five years of COVID closures and then the war, we want to celebrate.”

The festivities will include a tree-lighting ceremony at Manger Square, and the streets leading to the square and the Church of the Nativity will be full of decorative lights. A full-blown holiday gift fair and a Christmas Eve choir will both be back this year. The annual Christmas Eve Jerusalem-to-Bethlehem procession led by the Latin patriarch, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, which was so somber the past two years, is expected to be much more joyous. …

Continue reading >>>>>>>