Royal Births

Special Christmas Eve Installment

Like many royal births, Jesus came into the world in a very public way!

The year is 1661. We’re not far from Paris at the enormous Château de Fontainebleau — the elegant hunting lodge and summer residence of French royalty, where monarchs came for sport, to get away from the pressure of politics and public affairs, and to host extravagant soirees for close friends and visiting nobility.

For King Louis XIV, France’s energetic “Sun King,” the year had been fascinating in many ways. Across the channel, the English had just exhumed the corpse of Oliver Cromwell, who had died a few years earlier, and the body was subjected to a posthumous execution. Within months, Charles II, who had fled to France during Cromwell’s interregnum, was crowned king.

But the Sun King was not thinking about Charles’ problems. The king, who would be on the throne of France for an astonishing 72 years, was now only 21 years old, and he was soon to be a father for the first time!

On All Saints’ Day, a message is conveyed from...