Bagram, Afghanistan ? Christmas may be just another day on the job for troops stationed in Afghanistan, but they’re doing their best to get into the holiday spirit.

At Bagram Air Base, military personnel have put wreaths on their tent doors and filled them with colored lights and tiny Christmas trees. On top of a building at the main gate, a giant, inflatable snowman greets visitors.

“We work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and unfortunately Christmas is going to be a day that we have to work and fly,” said Air Force Col. Greg Marston, 46, a fighter pilot from Doylestown, Pa.

“Of course we’ll try and do some holiday things, but the mission goes on. The bad guys don’t stop, and we can’t either,” he said.

The death of Sgt. Steven Checo, 22, on Saturday was a sobering reminder of the mission. He was killed in a gunbattle with enemy fighters in the eastern town of Shkhin.

Another U.S. soldier was wounded over the weekend when attackers rocketed his tent at a U.S. base in Asadabad, near the Pakistan border. And in Kabul last week, two U.S. soldiers and their Afghan interpreter were injured in a grenade assault.

Today, soldiers will have a special buffet lunch and a visit by David Letterman.

Papal messages

In Vatican City, Pope John Paul II celebrated Midnight Mass early today against the backdrop of a possible war against Iraq — a war to which the Vatican is voicing increasing opposition.

In a packed St. Peter’s Basilica, John Paul presided over the midnight gathering, ushering in the joyous Christian holiday amid mounting tensions between Washington and Baghdad.

Hours earlier, the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, headlined its Christmas editions: “Humanity can win the ‘battle’ of peace.”

U.S. Army Sgt. Roland Spano Jr. of Baton Rouge, La., dressed as Santa Claus, greets soldiers at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Soldiers in Afghanistan are doing their best to must holiday spirit in a hostile setting far from home.

“While the clouds of war lengthen, the minds and hearts of men in all continents are drawn to Christmas,” the newspaper wrote in a front-page article.

It was the latest in a chorus of Vatican voices coming out against a war in Iraq, which the United States says is harboring weapons of mass destruction.

Despite the shadow cast by the specter of war, Christmas festivities were well under way at the Vatican on Christmas Eve, with the traditional unveiling of the life-sized Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square, depicting the birth of Jesus in a Bethlehem manger.

After nightfall, John Paul went to his studio window above the piazza and lit a candle, a silent vigil for peace that has been a hallmark of his 24-year papacy.

Sad Bethlehem

With Israeli troops in the shadows, the town known as the traditional birthplace of Jesus marked a dreary Christmas Eve on Tuesday — with no light-filled tree in Manger Square, no bells or music, and few pilgrims.

This year is the first since 1994 that Bethlehem is under Israeli occupation during the holiday. And although troops withdrew to the outskirts to let celebrations go on unimpeded, locals said they could not recall a sadder Christmas.

After more than two years of Israeli-Palestinian violence, “there is no joy in people’s hearts,” said Raed Zarrouk, 26.

Israeli soldiers swept into Bethlehem last month after a Palestinian suicide bomber from the town blew himself up in a bus in nearby Jerusalem, killing 11 people. Israel says its continued presence is needed to prevent more attacks.

Protesting the takeover, town leaders canceled all Christmas festivities except religious observances. The highlight was Midnight Mass at St. Catherine’s Church next to the Church of the Nativity, the fortress-like fourth-century church built over the grottos where tradition says Jesus was born.

As in years past, Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah delivered the sermon at the service. Sabbah, the highest-ranking Roman Catholic clergyman in the Holy Land, led a procession from Jerusalem. He was greeted by Palestinian Boy Scouts carrying — instead of the traditional drums and bagpipes — Palestinian flags and pictures of Yasser Arafat, who was banned from Bethlehem.