The Gate of Humility into the Church of the Nativity is just over four feet high and was added in 1272 A.D. to help repel raiders.
Visitors must stoop or bow in submission. Once inside, most tourists - about 1.25 million a year, in peaceful times - quickly queue on the right side of the 5th century Orthodox basilica and wait to enter the Grotto of the Nativity beneath the high altar.
I passed through the gate two years ago and headed for the altar icons. A priest appeared.
"You are American? You are Orthodox?", he asked, before assisting me. "We have so few people who come here to pray."
Frankly, I was glad to have a guide in the maze. The main lesson I learned was that the Church of the Nativity is not one building.
Nevertheless, most news about the recent Bethlehem siege described it has one church served by 30 or more priests, monks and nuns. Sadly, the reality is more splintered than that and recent events may have deepened the cracks.
Journalists said Palestinians in "the monastery" exchanged fire with Israeli troops. Which monastery? There are separate Roman Catholic and Greek monasteries and an Armenian Orthodox convent. "The priests" said they were not held hostage. Which priests? Gunmen raided food supplies and trashed monastic cells. In which cloister?
It is not even clear how the Palestinians entered "the church."
Time reported that they used the Gate of Humility. Yet it's hard to imagine several dozen al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade leaders, Tanzim militia, Hamas fighters and Palestinian Authority police being allowed through the Gate of Humility with 90 weapons, including assault rifles, and enough explosives for a reported 40 booby-traps.
Newsweek and numerous other publications say they shot their way through the main doors of the Roman Catholic Church of St. Catherine, a 19th century sanctuary adjoining the Orthodox basilica. But some reports said the Franciscan priests opened these doors, perhaps due to fear of being taken hostage.
Either way, how did gunmen get from the Franciscan passageways into the ancient basilica? Why did Palestinians - as shown in news photos -- end up sleeping on its cold stone floor, rather than in the Catholic sanctuary's pews? Orthodox churches do not have pews.
The Orthodox patriarch of Jerusalem believes these are not trivial questions. His words could not have been more blunt, as reporters surveyed the Greek monastery after the siege.
"All the media concentrated on the Franciscan quarter, where little damage was done," said Patriarch Irineos I, according to a Washington Times report. "Why? The Franciscans actually let the gunmen in then guided the gunmen to our rooms. ... The Franciscans then blocked their own rooms' doors with iron bars."
The New York Times and other publications reported that the most militant Palestinians appear to have lived, fought and died in the quarters of the Orthodox monks. Greek clerics feared Muslims would even attempt to claim these bloody sites as shrines. At one point, gunmen tried to bury one of their dead in the Greek monastery's garden.
Franciscan priests did report that gunmen tore up Bibles for toilet paper. The organ in their church was damaged, as was a mosaic. Meanwhile, Palestinian and Israeli leaders traded accusations about who caused fires in the monasteries. The militants stole candelabra, icons and other golden objects, but left them behind with their weapons. Everyone leaving the basilica passed through a metal detector.
A Vatican envoy quickly ruled that St. Catherine's had not been defiled. The first Mass after the siege was celebratory, complete with the sound of a tambourine. Reporters noted that this church's main gate had been repaired, since it appeared that gunmen shot off the lock.
Next door, Patriarch Irineos led solemn reconsecration rites, before the first Divine Liturgy in his violated sanctuary. One altar had been used a common table, the baptismal font as a washtub and parts of the nave as latrines. The Grotto of the Nativity was used as a morgue. And Eastern Orthodox believers were unable to celebrate Holy Week and their Easter on May 5.
Was this another tragic first in the history of one of Christendom's oldest churches?
The siege raised agonizing questions inside the Church of the Nativity, as well as outside of its ancient walls.