INFANT JESUS, Cult of the. - The cult of the B. G. [Child Jesus], not entirely unknown in the early Middle Ages, originated in the 12th and 13th centuries, when, in Christian spirituality, a passionate study of the human life of Jesus began, especially considered in its two extreme phases: infancy and the Passion, and this thanks to the influence of the liturgy, of the Crusades, of the numerous pilgrimages, of the pious meditations and devout practices of great saints, such as St. Bernard and St. Francis (the Christmas of Greccio, 1225), of the growing cult of the Eucharist (very many contemplated the B. G. hidden under the eucharistic species) and of the Madonna (almost always represented with the B. G. in her arms).
Many writers propagated devotion to the B. G., such as St. Aelred of Rievaulx, in the Tractatus de Iesu duodenni: PL 195, 361-500; St. Bernard, in the Omelie: PL 183, 360-536 and St. Bonaventure, in De 5 Festivitatibus pueri Iesu; Lignum Vitae (Opera omnia, VIII, Quaracchi 1882-1902, pp. 68-86). Devout treatises taught pious souls to assist the Madonna in swaddling, rocking and washing the B. G., and to play with the divine Child: thus, for example, Ubertino da Casale, in Arbor Vitae crucifixae D.N.I.X., Venice 1485, and G. Gerson. The visions in which the little Jesus appeared also became numerous: to St. Elizabeth of Schönau, to St. Clare, to Blessed Angela of Foligno, and above all to the venerable Margherita Ebner who enjoyed a particular friendship with the holy Child. Plastic representations showed the devout how he lies in the Madonna's bed after childbirth (from about the year 1300) or in the manger (from the 15th century) or in the cradle (which is slowly rocked by the devout) or even how a little angel teaches him to walk. Statues of the B. G. were also brought from Bethlehem, where they had been placed on the site of the Lord's nativity. It was the custom, at least in some regions of Belgium and Germany, to place small statues of the B. G. made of terracotta or clay in the foundations of houses; the B. G. was also the most fashionable subject of the very numerous painted or woodcut images and was often the theme of New Year's greeting images. Very ancient statues of the B. G. from this period are still venerated in the cathedral of Apt (Provence, 14th century), at Filzmoos (Austria, before 1500) and in that of Cebù, in the Philippine Islands (coming from Spain, first half of the 16th century).
In the 16th century began that devotion to the B. G. which more directly endured down to our own days. In Spain, St. Teresa taught her nuns to make statuettes of the B. G.; and in Italy the venerable Orsola Benincasa venerated some. In Lucca there was at this time an industry of such statuettes. From the same age seems also to date the B. G. of the Aracoeli and that of Altenhohenau in Bavaria. In the first half of the 17th century began the great flowering of the cult of the B. G., a cult promoted by the French school (under the influence of Cardinal de Bérulle, who especially delighted in the consideration of the Divine Word humbled in the figure of a child), and above all by Margaret of the Most Blessed Sacrament (of Beaune), who founded the Family of the B. G. and introduced the Crown of Jesus (12 Hail Marys and 3 Our Fathers) and the feast on the 25th of each month. The B. G. of Prague came from Spain around 1628. St. Alphonsus was an apostle of devotion to the B. G. and of the Bethlehem Way (v.). Numerous are the religious Congregations that take their name from the B. G.
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