You can't go to Israel and not go to Bethlehem!! This is such a famous city in the Bible-there are wayyy too many scripture references to list them all. However, we spent limited time here as it is now a Palestinian territory and therefore until their control. We even had to switch guides before entering the city as our Israeli guide was not allowed in.
I was so excited to go to Bethlehem and to see the cave (called "The Grotto") where they believe that Jesus was born. However, there is now a church (The Church of Nativity) that has built over top of the cave and sadly has decorated the cave with all sorts of ornate "religious" objects...you really couldn't tell it was even a cave. We also had to stand in line for over an hour in order to see the site and then only had about 2 minutes to really even look around the cave area. Many people were actually getting down on the ground to kiss the marked site of Christ's birthplace.
Here is the star on the floor that marks the spot where Jesus was born.
Across from the birth place is the area where they believe Jesus laid in the manger (as pictured below).
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