Candle at the Church of the Nativity

Light a candle

Light a candle where Christ was born

Write what is on your heart. We carry it into the church, light a real candle for it, and send you a video of your flame burning in Bethlehem - once, or every month.

Holy Land Treasures LLC, an independent service lighting candles at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Light a candle - US$19.99/mo or US$24.90 once
The bell tower of the Church of the Nativity above its fortress walls.
The gilded grille and Crusader mosaic vault above the Grotto of the Nativity.

The Grotto

Hic de Virgine Maria Jesus Christus natus est

Your candle burns above the star

Steps below the church is the cave the world has called the birthplace since the second century. A fourteen-pointed silver star is set into its marble floor, and the inscription around it does not say that Christ was born of the Virgin Mary. It says he was born of her here. Candles have burned around that star for seventeen centuries. Yours can be one of them.

Pilgrims setting lit candles into the sand of a brass candle stand beneath the icons.

How it works

Three steps, a real candle - once or every month

  1. 1

    Write your intention

    A name, a person, a hope, a grief - as short or as long as you like. We do not publish it and we do not share it.

  2. 2

    We light your candle

    We light a real candle for your intention at the church in Bethlehem - wax, wick and flame. Not a symbol rendered in software. We do this once, or every month - as you choose.

  3. 3

    You receive the video

    Within seven days of each lighting we email you a video of your candle burning, so you can see it was done.

A printed intention card held up before rows of burning candles.
The video you receive looks like this: your intention, printed, before the burning candles.
The cloistered courtyard of St Catherine beside the Church of the Nativity, with the column of St Jerome at its centre.

The church above

The oldest church still in daily use

Constantine's basilica was dedicated over the cave in 339 and rebuilt by Justinian two centuries later. Fire, revolt and conquest have passed over Bethlehem since - in 614 a Persian army is said to have left it standing because it recognised the Magi in the mosaic above the door - and the building has never had to be raised again. Worship has continued beneath its roof, almost without a break, ever since.

A father lifting his daughter to a candle stand inside the Church of the Nativity.
Thin beeswax tapers and tall white candles burning in a stand before the red damask wall.A father holding his daughter as she reaches for the candle he has just lit.

You are not the first

Everyone who comes here has to stoop

The only way in is the Door of Humility, a doorway barely four feet high, cut down so that no one could ride through it - kings and pilgrims alike have had to bend to enter. Inside, the candle stands are never empty. People who could not make the journey have always sent their names ahead with someone who could. This is one more way.

Light a candle

Holy Land Treasures LLC, an independent service lighting candles at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Choose your candle

Private. Read only by us, when we light your candle.

Your intention may reveal your religious beliefs. By sending it you explicitly agree that we may read and store it for one purpose only - lighting your candle. We never publish it, share it, or use it to advertise anything.

Your payment goes to Holy Land Treasures LLC, not to the church. It is a purchase, not a donation, and it is not tax-deductible.