A boy appears who seems able to give the world what humanity has always prayed for: an end to conflict, poverty, disease. Is he an illusion conjured up by mass hysteria, or is he the long-awaited messiah? Different narrators in various parts of the world, from a Protestant minister in New York to a young Hindu in Sri Lanka to a doctor in central Africa, tell their stories of the boy, but don't always agree on whether their dreams have come true or whether they have lost something important. How much would we be willing to sacrifice?