SW News: This Christmas season, the US Postal Services has come out with a beautiful stamp portraying the Blessed Virgin and the Baby Jesus. It is actually an oil-on-panel painting from the 16th century entitled Virgin and Child.

The work is the creation of a Florentine artist who is known as the Master of the Scandicci Lamentation. The painting can be seen in the Robert Dawson Evans Collection at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. It was Greg Breeding, creative director of the Journey Group design company in Charlottesville, who designed the stamp. Every two years, the department issues a first-class stamp depicting the Virgin and the Infant Jesus.

In the painting, Our Lady casts a downward glance at Her Child and one of her arms holds Him protectively around the waist while the other touches his arm. Baby Jesus looks to the left out of the frame. Such stamps based on religious motifs have been released since the 1960s.

According to Jenny Utterback, the USPS organization development vice president, “The 2022 religious Christmas stamp is a beautiful piece of art, with particular meaning this time of year. I choose my holiday cards with care, sign them with love or best wishes, and may write a personal note inside."

The stamp belongs to the first-class category and it costs 60 cents. Some of the other stamps released this season are: "Holiday Elves," "Snowy Beauty," "Winter Blooms," "Hanukkah" and "Kwanzaa”.

The stamp showing Hanukkah has a multi-colored menorah, a candelabrum with nine arms that is lit during the eight-day feast of Hanukkah in the Jewish calendar. It is celebrated from December 18 to 26.

On the other hand, Kwanza is an Afro-American festival with African roots. It shows two children standing with a candle holder and seven lit candles named Mishumaa Saba before them. It is celebrated from December 26 to January 1.