According to local Assyrian Orthodox Christians, St Mary’s was founded by St Thomas on the gravesite of one of the Biblical magi, the pre-Islamic Persian priests who trotted across to Bethlehem to greet the infant Jesus, inventing Christmas presents in the process. This, the Assyrian Christians claim, makes it the world’s oldest still-standing church. In fact the structure you’ll see doesn’t really feel that old. It still contains four antique tombstones including that of the supposed magus but his mummified body was apparently ‘kidnapped’ by Soviet troops during WWII and taken to Kiev.
