Stealing Baby Jesus

The headline in today’s Inquirer

shocked me to my very soul: “Baby Jesus

Stolen from the Shrine of St. John Neumann,”

Northern Liberties neighborhood,

Fifth Street & Girard. In broad daylight, too.

Okay, it was only a plaster figurine,

not expensive, though very much beloved—

according to the shrine’s director—

there among the sainted bishop’s

Bibles, vestments, and eyeglasses.

Criminy! Is nothing sacred anymore?

Only last week, a gold crown was stolen

from a statue of the Virgin Mary

in a Center City Roman Catholic Church.

It’s getting so you don’t know who to trust.

But a gold crown at least makes fiscal sense.

Gold is gold, after all. It’s got real value:

pawn it, maybe sell it on the street,

buy yourself a quart of Thunderbird wine,

a spoonful of smack, a hit of crack.

But a plaster Baby Jesus? I mean

let’s get real. What are you supposed to do

with a plaster Baby Jesus? Bounce it

on your knee? Play peek-a-boo I-see-you? 

A sin. A sacrilege. And all for what?

W. D. Ehrhart has authored or edited a number of collections of poetry and prose, most recently Thank You for Your Service: Collected Poems and What We Can and Can’t Afford: Essays on Vietnam, Patriotism, and American Life, both from McFarland & Company, Inc. He holds a Ph.D. from University of Wales at Swansea and taught at The Haverford School in Pennsylvania from 2001 to 2019.