Canadian Chapel at Shepherds’ Field honours nation’s benefactors

Shepherds’ Field near Bethlehem is an intriguing site in the Holy Land that deserves special mention. Today it is under the care of the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land, the same order of friars who acquired the site in the year 1347. 

When St. Jerome went to live in Bethlehem in the year 386 he also mentioned this place on several occasions, associating it with the biblical Migdal Eder (a tower mentioned in Genesis 35:21 in the context of the death of Jacob’s wife, Rachel). 

He related that a thousand paces to the east of Bethlehem lay the field where the angels announced the birth of Christ to the shepherds. 

A quiet place softened by the air of grace and tranquility, here is located the traditional site believed to be where on the first Christmas Eve the shepherds encountered the angel announcing the birth of Jesus.

The field is located in the Christian town of Beit Sahur (translated as the “House of the Night Watch”), which today is a small suburb southeast of Bethlehem, on the southern edge of a field on a broad plateau dotted with various caves.

The site is entered through a stately stone gate with an arch depicting the words of the angel in Latin recorded in Luke 2: Gloria in Excelsis Deo (“Glory to God in the Highest”). There follows a paved walking path through a tree-covered field planted during the British Mandate (1918-1948).

This short walk opens to a plaza with a splashing fountain in the middle, commemorating the shepherds and their sheep.

Pilgrims can be seen entering and celebrating Mass in a few of the caves that dot the landscape as well as in outdoor shelters. 

These original caves reveal how large the underground caverns were, complete with air shafts that provide natural light and ventilation. 

According to tradition, St. Helena built a convent here in the 4th century. 

Today the ruins of an ancient Byzantine Monastery can be seen, an archeological zone open for exploration.

Visible are the remains of a church, courtyards, cisterns, a bakery and rooms with mosaics, proof of a monastery that flourished between the 4th and 8th centuries.

For countless generations the fields in this area were a place where wheat was sown, adjoining and leading up to Bethlehem, the city of David.

The site overlooks the historic plain known as the Field of Boaz or “Field of Ruth” mentioned in Ruth 2:2. 

This is where Ruth, while gathering up barley left behind by the harvesters, met Boaz and married him, becoming the great-grandmother of King David. 

David himself was a shepherd in the same fields, tending his father’s flocks until he was anointed by Samuel, where the present Carmel in Bethlehem is located today (1 Sam 16:11-13).

Ironically, Bethlehem is translated as the “House of Bread,” while Christ is the “Bread of Life.” 

Atop the highest point of Shepherds’ Field is a beautiful chapel officially known as Shepherds’ Field Chapel or the Sanctuary Excelsis Deo. 

This tent-shaped church with sloping walls was built in a pentagonal shape with five apses having an inclined plane, mimicking the structure of a field tent. 

It is also affectionately known by some as the “Canadian Chapel” of the angels and the shepherds. This is because the chapel, completed in 1953, was financed by Canadian benefactors. 

Of the four altars, the altar in the center of the chapel was dedicated in 1954 with a carved Canadian maple leaf, supported at the four corners by bronze figures of kneeling shepherds.

The altar commemorates Canadians who contributed to its realization, accompanied by dedicatory words carved in Latin: 

SANCTUARIUM S.S. ANGELORUM AD PASTORES. CANADA AEDIFICANDUM CURAVIT A.D. MCMLIV (“The most holy sanctuary of the angels where the shepherds are. Canada took care to build in the year of our Lord 1954”).

Over the course of centuries, various shrines have been built upon the site, while in the words of Bishop Fulton Sheen, “None can have been more beautiful than the little sanctuary which now bears the maple leaf among its sculpture.” 

Indeed, the maple leaf is not only the symbol of Canada, but also, like the shamrock of Ireland, a symbol that harkens to the Holy Trinity, depicting three persons in one God (i.e. three leaves in one maple leaf). 

This beautiful chapel is forever remembered as the last work of the celebrated Holy Land architect Antonio Barluzzi before his untimely retirement and return to Rome. 

The exterior depicts an angel of the Lord in bronze, descending above the main entrance, announcing the good news of the birth of Christ, with three bells above that clash and peal, calling out the joy of Christmas. 

Inside the light flows joyously through the countless windows in the ceiling, resembling stars, and surrounded by carvings of ten angels, bringing to mind the first Christmas Eve.

Scripture quotes commemorating the event dot the walls and three side altars in little apses include vivid frescos commemorating the events of the shepherds recorded in the Gospels. 

One such is the apparition of the angel announcing the good news, the other is the adoration of the child Jesus in the grotto while the last is the rejoicing of the shepherds, recalling to others everything that had been told to them concerning the child. 

In gold mosaic around the inside of the dome are the familiar words taken from Luke 2:14, interpreted to have been sung by the angels: 

GLORIA IN EXCELSIS DEO ET IN TERRA PAX HOMINIBUS BONAE VOLUNTATIS (“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will”). 

In the circular rotunda inside the chapel, pilgrims gather to sing Christmas carols such as Silent Night or O Little Town of Bethlehem in various languages.

Canadian pilgrims are fond of singing the Huron Carol (or ’Twas in the Moon of Wintertime), Canada’s oldest Christmas hymn, written in the 1640s by St. Jean de Brebeuf, the Jesuit missionary who worked in Canada among the Hurons. 

As the Christians in Bethlehem are fond of saying, “Every day is Christmas in Bethlehem.”

By special indult, pilgrims pray here the Votive Mass of the Nativity of Our Lord found in the Roman Missal, the Second Mass of Christmas at Dawn.

The encounter of the shepherds is recorded in Luke 2: 8-20, which pilgrims read on site, meditating upon the significance of the angelic words, which include: 

“Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you goodness of great joy which shall be to all the people; for today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you, who is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign to you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”

The shepherds, who were considered poor and the lowest of the low, are believed to have immediately recognized that Christ was as a lamb upon hearing the words “swaddling clothes,” exactly the way in which they wrapped a newborn lamb. 

J.P. Sonnen is a travel writer, tour operator and history docent with Orbis Catholic Travel LLC.