Monday, May 7 ~ Dana Wright

Mar Elias English students

Today was a day for all of us Pilgrims of Ibillin to be touched by the hearts of young people in modern Israel. We spoke with young teenagers at the Mar Elias school in the morning, allowing them to practice their English on us and us to practice our Arabic on them (no contest!). Then we drove to Nazareth, where Mary and Joseph grew up and where Jesus spent the bulk of his childhood.

Nap time at Al Tufula

There we visited the Al Tafula Center for Women and Children founded by Nabila Espanioly. We saw young toddlers tossing and turning and twisting their little bodies into impossible contortions during nap time. We listened to Nabila tell of her work with these dear ones and their mothers, whom she helps inspire and empower by affirming their native wisdom (what Nabila called their “heritage knowledge”) and connecting that wisdom with scientific insights.

Having lunch at Liwan, hosted by Sally Azzam and her partners in the Culture Cafe

In the afternoon we visited the Liwan Cultural Cafe and lunched on frekhey (green cracked wheat) and met owner Sally Azzam. Sally grew up in Nazareth largely ignorant of and sheltered from knowing what her Palestinian identity meant under subtle forms of occupation in Israel. But as she grew into womanhood she learned what it meant to be oppressed by the 50 laws that keep her and her people second class citizens in her own land. After years of activism she founded her cafe as an experiment in cultural subversion, providing a space for all people to engage in conversations that really matter about improving life in Nazareth.

Later in the afternoon we visited several churches built over important excavation sites related to the common lives of Nazareth’s most famous family (to put it mildly!). We visited (1) the excavations that may be the remains of the houses of Mary and Joseph at the Sisters of Nazareth Monastery (where the sisters did the excavating!); (2) the Church of the Annunciation at the site at which the Angel Gabriel announced the Good News to an unsuspecting young girl; and (3) remains from the kind of workshop Jesus’ father Joseph maintained excavated under Saint Joseph’s Church, where perhaps Jesus learned his original trade as a carpenter.

For me it was a day to reflect on what it meant for the Creator to became a small human creature-a baby, a child, and a young person. Jesus was not a humanoid or a generic human who came to earth fully formed as an adult. Jesus was a full blooded Palestinian Jew who was born and who grew up in a concrete place and time-just like all genuinely human beings. He cried like a baby when he was hungry, like the babies at Al Tufula do. He wet his diapers and threw his food on the floor. When he learned to walk he stubbed his toe and fell down (and cried only if he saw that his parents were watching!). He felt the wind and the rain and the burning sun as we did today. He ate food with his fingers. And he no doubt smashed his little finger with a mallet on more than one occasion as he painfully learned his father’s trade (and as his father winced and laughed at the sight of it all!).

But the Incarnation means even more than that Jesus knew human experience as an individual Palestinian Jew. To be fully human means that Jesus felt the full forces of economic, political, and religious oppression that surrounded him all his life. Even as a baby he must have felt deep down in his bones the anxieties that his mother and father felt continually in their bones under Roman occupation. The very historical experience of oppression was in their DNA and had to be passed down into Jesus’ DNA (at least through Mary!). In other words, the Incarnation began before Mary got pregnant and before Jesus got born! Jesus was fully human!

And what about their forced emigration to Egypt?  Did not this devastating experience make an impact on the Christ child? Even coming back to Palestine under the potential threat of Archaelus left its mark (potential threats can be more fearsome because they are always threatening). Jesus’ coming of age in Nazareth meant that he also witnessed uprisings and crucifixions and the imperial propaganda that were commonplace to Rome’s oppressive modus operandi of control. He would have suffered as a child from the plight of many families drained by overtaxation, defeated by the lack of opportunity, and dominated by the pall of military presence everywhere. No doubt the children we met today have been deeply impacted by the form of oppression they and their families experience day to day in Ibillin and Nazareth. Meeting them and contemplating Jesus’ life in Nazareth under occupation gives all of us a truer sense of the amazing truth that God became human precisely in a place like Nazareth. The Incarnation was Nazareth imbued.

Throughout today I kept thinking of what one ancient church father (Athanasius or Irenaeus?) once noted: “What Jesus has not assumed he has not saved.” More positively stated, one could also say: “What Jesus has assumed he intends to save.”

As we spoke to students in Ibillin in the morning and toured through Jesus’ boyhood home Nazareth in the afternoon, this ancient theological insight regarding the profound significance of the Incarnation took on new meaning for me. Jesus must assume our full humanity if he fully saves us. And his full humanity included his experience of oppression. Jesus assumed the whole of human existence (including oppression) because Jesus intends to redeem human experience in its entirety!  Jesus will not just redeem individuals. He will redeem heritages. He will redeem traditions. He will redeem history. He will redeem every aspect of what makes human beings what they are. He will redeem economics and politics and language. He will redeem human relationships to land and to non-human creation. He will redeem cities and nations and corporations. And he will redeem all of it because he himself became fully human. And what he has assumed he will save. Sola Deo Gloria.

Monday, May 7 ~ Judy Wright

Today is Day 10 of our Pilgrimage to Israel/Palestine. We have 3 more days to absorb as much as we can from these amazing people and their stories. When I get home, one of the first things that I plan to do is to walk around my neighborhood  appreciating that I can walk without being stopped and challenged to produce my documents, that my neighbors don’t carry guns as all Israelis living in settlements are required to do, that the park near my house where little children play is not tear gassed or strafed with rubber bullets, that my front door won’t be broken down at 2am and my son taken blindfolded, hands zip-tied, interrogated by military police without my presence and if the answers aren’t correct or if the police are in a whimsical mood, he could be imprisoned for months without due process, that I can travel less than 40 minutes to see the ocean, a privilege many West Bankers are denied due to checkpoints and therefore have never seen the Mediterranean, that no one is trying to take my home and put me in a refugee camp, and that I have employment.

Samar teaches Arabic coffee-making

The day began with a lesson in making the perfect pot of Arabic coffee from Samar who prepares our meals and provides for our needs. The measurements of coffee are a precise 4 heaping spoons of Nakleh coffee, constant watching as the water boils, remove from the burner and pass the boiling brew over the  burner while blessing it saying “Father Son and Holy Ghost” then covering it for exactly 2 minutes. She now pronounced the thick sludge as “Perfect”.

Dana, Sami, Judy

Sami is our bus driver and his story offers more insight into the complexities of living as a non Jew in this land. His family has lived in the Old City of Jerusalem for over 600 years which equals about 7 generations. He has 6 children and 8 grandchildren. I am an only child so learning about families and their children is fascinating to me. I haven’t seen any homeless people and I was told that the families take care of their own and no one is left on the streets no matter how poor the family may be.  Sami feels that Jews and Arabs should sit down and talk with each other–the only cost would be the price of a cup of coffee. He suggested that schools should offer in their curriculum a class in learning about peaceful resolutions to conflict. Sami has been driving buses and ambulances since he was 17 and watching him thread this 55 passenger bus through narrow streets that used to be donkey paths is mesmerizing.

Our next adventure was to visit a high school class in the Mar Elias school. We were standing in front of the class answering their questions when I decided to branch out and go sit in the middle of the students. I really wanted to connect better with them so what better way than to ask their names. I sent around a notebook and asked them to write their name in English and Arabic and to also write what they hoped to do with their education. One young student told me that he wanted to work as an aircraft engineer but that would never happen because the Israelis wouldn’t allow him to work with planes due to “security” reasons.  These kids were lively, noisy, fun to watch as they teased each other. Some of the girls had their nails painted just like my 16 year old granddaughter. There were 2 Muslim girls in the class who wore traditional dress with head scarves and I wondered how they processed the stylish girls with long curly hair when theirs was covered. Knowing that family is very important in this culture, I showed them a picture of my granddaughter who would be about their age.  One of the students handed me his phone and asked me to type in her number into his contacts. They were enjoying teasing me so I guess I had been “accepted” and I felt very welcome in their midst.

Mar Elias tenth graders we met in English class

A visit to the Al Tufula Center for Women and Children in Nazareth to meet Nabila Espanioly was the next chapter on our journey to hear more stories about the people living in this Holy Land which many times is not so holy.

Nabila Espanioly, Founder & Director of Al Tufula

Nabila had a vision to provide a resource for women in the form of childcare and early childhood learning for their children. She worked with the women to help them see that they were capable and to be empowered to make changes.  She told the story of a village that needed a street to be improved. After going to the men in the village and to the authorities and being told they would have to wait, the women, because of their new sense of self worth and the ability to accomplish what they wanted, decided to build the road themselves. They collected money from the villagers and then worked at night to build the road. They did it–they completed the road and then the politicians came to the dedication ceremony and took all the credit for the road’s success. Empowering women to take an active role in making decisions for their lives has been dangerous for Nabila and she has had a Fatwah issued on her life.

Sally Azzam at Liwan

Meeting Sally Azzam, the co-owner of the Liwan Cultural Cafe and having lunch in her beautiful cafe was our next stop. She talked about growing up in Nazareth and attending private school where she was protected from what was happening on the outside and she talked about the differences for Palestinians in the West Bank where they are subjected to many checkpoints and in Nazareth where there are no check points.  Her first experience with discrimination was when she went to University and couldn’t apply to take classes in science because she might learn how to make a bomb.  Inside Israel exists a glass wall for non Jews in which things look right but deeper down 50 laws exist that discriminate in employment, education, where one lives. She feels that she is in a minority within a minority as both a Christian and a woman. Her cafe provides a place where people can talk freely without fear and provides a place that of hope and interaction with people.  The government had a strangle hold on the businesses as a way to control the people but now more shops are opening.  Her cultural center celebrates the Palestinian culture. She calls her efforts to resist the occupation “cultural resistance” meaning that her cafe is a place to celebrate the culture through food, music, conversation and products made by Palestinians.

Sunday, May 6 ~ Heidi Saikaly

If you are considering touring Israel and Palestine, I encourage you to sign up for the next Pilgrims of Ibilin tour.  Then, tie up the laces of your sturdiest walking shoes, gird up your loins, and get going. You are in for an intense time of learning and fellowship.

This afternoon, we toured sites of Jesus’ ministry on the Sea of Galilee — Tabgha, Primacy of Peter, Capernaum, and Mount of Beatitudes.  One can feel overwhelmed by the glory of the architecture, statues, stained-glass windows, and archaeological evidence of Jesus’ life.  Yet, it was a simple, unadorned plaque on the Primacy of Peter Church that I loved, most–it faces the Sea of Galilee and states,

“At thy word I will let down the net.
Luke 5:5
The deeds and miracles of Jesus are not actions of the past.
Jesus is waiting for those who are
still prepared to take risks at His word
because they trust His power utterly.”

These are life-giving words for our journey, as we prepare to work to honor the stories of our Palestinian Christian friends–each has emphasized Jesus’ uncompromising vision of  peace for ALL God’s precious children of the Holy Land–Jews, Palestinians (Muslim and Christian).

Abuna Elias Chacour with Charlie Lewis

In the evening, we met with Abuna Elias Chacour, who became a refugee in 1948 when his family was forced out of their Palestinian village of Biram by the Israeli government. His Mar Elias Educational Institution schools have given teachers and students a place to build bridges of friendship and understanding.  Abuna says, “God does not kill. All are born as babies created in the image and likeness of God. Christian, Muslim, and Jew are blood brothers, children of Abraham. Peace with justice is the dream and right of all human beings.”

Let us, likewise, get our hands dirty to counteract the world’s messages of tribalism with Jesus Christ’s unifying activity.