War baby reminds us of what Christmas really means

Your classic nativity scene has Mary and Joseph, a baby in a manger and animals choreographed in an arc around them. There may be shepherds, including a child with a lamb, and even wise men bearing expertly-encased gifts.

The photograph I’m looking at as I write this is a different kind of nativity scene. It depicts Mariupol, on the Sea of Azov, at the south-eastern corner of Ukraine, in March.

The scene is a war zone, with twisted metal, concrete buildings and the wreckage of apartments. A bloodied woman in bedclothes is picking her way down the stairs. Behind her, men in paramilitary gear carry heavy-looking bags. The woman looks dazed. Your eye is drawn to her belly, in the foreground of the picture: she is heavily pregnant.

And it becomes clear what we’re witnessing. A woman on the verge of giving birth, being led to a safer place. A nativity scene. No ox and ass — instead recently called-up soldiers. No Joseph — instead, rough but kind strangers, in an act of compassion and solidarity. No manger — but a shattered building.

The woman’s name is Mariana Vishegirskaya; she named her baby Veronika, after the woman on the way of the cross who wiped Jesus’s bloodied face.

We want Christmas to be cosy, heartwarming, warm and nostalgic. But the first Christmas wasn’t. The Jews were under brutal foreign occupation — much as those in eastern Ukraine are today. Mary had to travel while heavily pregnant, on a pretty uncomfortable donkey’s back. Soon after the birth the holy family were forced to migrate to Egypt, a journey scarcely cosier than the stretcher ride Ms Vishegirskaya made across Mariupol. Mary’s baby was in mortal danger the moment he was born; so was baby Veronika. Mary gave birth with little protection from the elements; Ms Vishegirskaya, as the photograph shows, had none.

We want Christmas to be so much happier than this Christmas will be. But here’s the mystery: Ms Vishegirskaya’s experience is closer to the original Christmas than the Christmas we long for. We may be angry, exasperated, humiliated and sad that we can’t have the Christmas we want this year. But we’re closer, perhaps closer than ever, to the real thing.

Sam Wells is Vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square