Ash Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Matthew 6.1-6, 16-21
Strange, on this first day of the season of Lent, a season historically marked by intentional practices of piety, that in our gospel text Jesus warns us against these very practices. Most of us are familiar with the practice of “giving up” something for Lent; giving up chewing gum was a popular Lenten discipline in my high school days. Scripture calls for three specific pieties for the faithful: almsgiving, prayer and fasting. I suppose chewing gum fell under the rubric of fasting.
Here, in his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is very clear: BEWARE of almsgiving, prayer and fasting. BEWARE of the very practices God requires of us. Jesus does not say that we are to be the guardians of how others live out their piety. We are to concentrate on ourselves and, particularly, our own “good deeds” and our motivations.
The U.S. claims that standing in solidarity with the State of Israel is one of its good deeds—standing with the victims who suffered so terribly during the holocaust. We claim to stand with a democracy surrounded by hostile nations. Isn’t it noble to stand with those who suffer, to stand with those whose lives are endangered simply because of their ethnicity? Who could possibly argue against such a heroic undertaking?
But Jesus warns us to examine our motivations—are we really noble heroes protecting the weak and powerless, the widow and the orphan? Jesus calls on us to discern what God might be calling us to do as we participate in this conflict between two peoples who wish to inhabit the same land. What is God’s will for these people and for their land and how can help bring it about?
It is easy for me, having seen how Palestinians are persecuted and demeaned under Israeli occupation, to point the finger at the evil Israelis who bulldoze houses, shoot non-violent protesters in the streets and imprison children who throw stones. It’s always easier to point the finger at others’ motivations—much harder to examine my own. But here is Jesus, reminding us that it is my own house I must examine, not Israel’s. Even though I do not carry the gun or drive the bulldozer, how do my own tax dollars work in Israel to support the weak and powerless?
What I see when I visit Israel and Palestine, is that my tax dollars bought guns and ammunition used to destroy property and people in Gaza last year. One Palestinian friend whose family was not allowed to leave Gaza to come with him for graduate studies in Denver, told about his daughter’s puzzlement: “Daddy, these airplanes and missiles are from where you are, from America.” My tax dollars have been used to construct checkpoints where Palestinians wait in long lines every day just to get to work; my tax dollars have been used to fund an army that bulldozes Palestinian homes simply because they cannot get a permit to add a bedroom.
I cannot blame Israel—I have not bothered to pay attention to how my money is used. U.S. unconditional military support for Israel (2.3b in 2008) —this is not Israel’s problem; it is mine. The foreign aid I have supplied to Israel has been used to assuage my conscience for atrocities committed sixty-seventy years ago, when the world chose to turn its back on the Jews, refusing to intervene in the killings or to accept the millions of refugees fleeing the carnage. But it has not brought about justice God demands for the people of the land, either for Israelis or for Palestinians. This Lent, as I ponder what I can do to bring peace and justice for the Palestinians and Israelis, Jesus’ sermon is a timely reminder for me to examine my own part in the oppression and violence.
Gracious God of mercy, as we enter into this season of introspection and penitence, preparing to remember your son’s life, death and resurrection, help us to examine our role in life, death and resurrection in our own small world where we seek to live out your justice and mercy. Help us find signs of your will and join in efforts to raise the dead where we live and work. Amen.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
A Lenten Geography - an invitation
Although it has become a message for every age, Jesus’ ministry happened in a specific place and time. As I walked the streets of Jerusalem, sailed on the Sea of Galilee and traveled the winding road down to the Jordan or through the hill country, I kept remembering that Jesus walked the same dusty roads and climbed the same dry hills I was walking each day—the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea—the land that the Romans called Judaea and later renamed Palestine. Today we call it Palestine or Israel or sometimes even Israel/Palestine, revealing our own confusion and ambivalence about this disputed territory.
In the time of Jesus, the land which was the Roman province of Iudaea or Judaea was the scene of war and violence, bloodshed, torture and displacement. The Roman occupation meant onerous taxes for the Judean peasants; when they objected, their protests were often put down violently, with all the protesters killed or crucified and entire towns burned to the ground. Finally the Roman Emperor Hadrian defeated the Jews for the last time in the third Jewish rebellion in 135 CE; by renaming the land Syria Palaestina (and renaming Jerusalem Aelia Capitolina) he hoped to wipe out all trace of the Jewish people and put an end to the Jewish rebellions. The Jews were even banished from Jerusalem and the surrounding area and Rome brought foreigners in to colonize the area.
When Jesus walked these roads, the land was under occupation—the Roman Emperor and his army, his governors and procurators controlled the land and the lives of everyone who lived on the land. The Judeans disputed Rome's control of their lives and their land. Today ownership of the land is once again disputed and the part of the land deemed Palestinian is again under armed occupation.
Beginning with the story of his birth, the gospel writers make us acutely aware of the role of the Roman Empire in the lives of even the most ordinary people in first century Palestine. In Luke’s account, the story of Jesus’ birth opens as Mary and Joseph make their way from Nazareth to Bethlehem for the mandatory counting—required by the Empire for all of the occupied people. The Empire wants to determine the value of that which it possesses. Matthew’s account, too, is specific about Jesus’ birthplace: “in Bethlehem of Judea,” and about the time: “In the time of King Herod” (Matt 2.1).
Even the preparation for Jesus’ birth was rooted in the land. Gabriel comes “to a city of Galillee named Nazareth” (Lk 1.26) to tell Mary of the impending birth. Mary travels the hills of Palestine, from Nazareth to “a city of Judah” (which places it near Jerusalem). So we are reminded that Jesus was born, not only in a specific place, but in a specific time, with a specific relationship to what was going on in the world. And so it is today. The land of Palestine/Israel is a specific geography and the story of the passion, of God coming to live among us, of God’s work in the world to bring about a new way of life for God’s creation, is ongoing.
Where do we meet God today?
Where is God at work among the people of Palestine and Judea today?
The stories of the “living stones,” the people of this holy land, tell us much about God’s work. Each time I visit the Holy Land, the people I meet beg me to tell their stories, with confidence that if the world knew what was happening in the land today, their lives would change and the occupation, the 60-year Nakba (catastrophe), would end. There is a growing movement among Jews within Israel that would end the occupation because of the way the system of checkpoints and walls and permits for Palestinians has damaged the humanity of the Jews themselves. Hear some of the stories as we reflect on the texts for the Sundays in Lent—stories of the “living stones” of the land of Palestine today—people working for justice and peace in this much-ravaged land today.
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In the time of Jesus, the land which was the Roman province of Iudaea or Judaea was the scene of war and violence, bloodshed, torture and displacement. The Roman occupation meant onerous taxes for the Judean peasants; when they objected, their protests were often put down violently, with all the protesters killed or crucified and entire towns burned to the ground. Finally the Roman Emperor Hadrian defeated the Jews for the last time in the third Jewish rebellion in 135 CE; by renaming the land Syria Palaestina (and renaming Jerusalem Aelia Capitolina) he hoped to wipe out all trace of the Jewish people and put an end to the Jewish rebellions. The Jews were even banished from Jerusalem and the surrounding area and Rome brought foreigners in to colonize the area.
When Jesus walked these roads, the land was under occupation—the Roman Emperor and his army, his governors and procurators controlled the land and the lives of everyone who lived on the land. The Judeans disputed Rome's control of their lives and their land. Today ownership of the land is once again disputed and the part of the land deemed Palestinian is again under armed occupation.
Beginning with the story of his birth, the gospel writers make us acutely aware of the role of the Roman Empire in the lives of even the most ordinary people in first century Palestine. In Luke’s account, the story of Jesus’ birth opens as Mary and Joseph make their way from Nazareth to Bethlehem for the mandatory counting—required by the Empire for all of the occupied people. The Empire wants to determine the value of that which it possesses. Matthew’s account, too, is specific about Jesus’ birthplace: “in Bethlehem of Judea,” and about the time: “In the time of King Herod” (Matt 2.1).
Even the preparation for Jesus’ birth was rooted in the land. Gabriel comes “to a city of Galillee named Nazareth” (Lk 1.26) to tell Mary of the impending birth. Mary travels the hills of Palestine, from Nazareth to “a city of Judah” (which places it near Jerusalem). So we are reminded that Jesus was born, not only in a specific place, but in a specific time, with a specific relationship to what was going on in the world. And so it is today. The land of Palestine/Israel is a specific geography and the story of the passion, of God coming to live among us, of God’s work in the world to bring about a new way of life for God’s creation, is ongoing.
Where do we meet God today?
Where is God at work among the people of Palestine and Judea today?
The stories of the “living stones,” the people of this holy land, tell us much about God’s work. Each time I visit the Holy Land, the people I meet beg me to tell their stories, with confidence that if the world knew what was happening in the land today, their lives would change and the occupation, the 60-year Nakba (catastrophe), would end. There is a growing movement among Jews within Israel that would end the occupation because of the way the system of checkpoints and walls and permits for Palestinians has damaged the humanity of the Jews themselves. Hear some of the stories as we reflect on the texts for the Sundays in Lent—stories of the “living stones” of the land of Palestine today—people working for justice and peace in this much-ravaged land today.
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Friday, April 10, 2009
Easter Greetings from Bethlehem
Bright Stars of Bethlehem
Lenten Reflections 2009
Easter Sunday, April 12
Dear Sisters and Brothers, Dear Friends,
Salaam from Bethlehem during this Passion Week.
The passion story could have ended with 3 men hanging on the cross: the first a criminal who was taking advantage of the instability under the Roman occupation, the second a fighter resisting the foreign dominance, and the third an “innocent” proclaiming the reign of God. And Palestine could have proved to be yet again only a battlefield on which empires can demonstrate their powers, or a cemetery full of tombs of martyrs. And the disciples could have just indulged like so many others in singing litanies of death, cursing the Romans, taking an oath to retaliate or going around trying to win sympathy for their just struggle. This would be a normal scenario in Palestine.
But what happened on Easter Sunday had nothing to do with normality. It was something extraordinary, an occurrence never heard of, and an event truly revolutionary. It wasn't a continuation of the human tragedy in Palestine, but it was a divine intervention. Through this intervention, the land known formerly as a battle field became a Holy Land, and where once cemeteries stood turned into a garden where angels appeared; and those mourning their hero became agents of transformation. The disciples could have spent their entire lives weeping over their lost cause, their killed victim and their shattered hopes. Instead and because of the divine intervention, they caught an incredible vision, they acquired tremendous courage, and they went around proclaiming the crucified as living. They were not anymore mere victims asking for help, but they were transformed to become people with a message that the world is eager to hear. What they have experienced firsthand was an answer to a global longing for life abundant that grows in the context of death, for true hope that shines through helpless situations and for lives that bloom in windy seasons. What God achieved in Palestine on that Easter Sunday through the resurrection of Christ from the dead is still felt today. This is the reason for our being here, and this transforming power is what our ministry is all about.
Thank you for being to us a resurrecting power and support. He is risen! He is risen indeed!
Rev. Dr. Mitri RahebSenior Pastor, Christmas Lutheran ChurchPresident, Diyar Consortium
Bethlehem, Easter 2009
Learn more about the work of the Lutheran Christmas Church in Bethlehem: http://www.brightstarsbethlehem.org/ and http://www.annadwa.org/
No King But the Emperor
Friday in Holy Week
April 10, 2009
John 18.1-19.42
“We have no king but the emperor.” (John 18.15)
There is a contest going on here, between those who uphold the status quo and those who want something different—the people of Israel, living under the occupation of the Roman army want new life. The temple authorities were an integral part of the power structure that ruled Palestine in the first century. This is how it worked: the Roman governor left much of the governance to the king, Herod, and the temple authorities. So long as they could keep the peace and the taxes coming in, the Romans were happy, their army well provided for. Because he wanted to keep the Romans happy, Caiaphas had said earlier that it was better to have one person die for the people (John 11.50). Someone had to preserve order and Jesus, with all his parading through Jerusalem on the donkey, was riling the people up as they shouted “Hosanna” and cried out for freedom.
The present-day occupants of Jerusalem and its surrounding towns also cry out for new life. The Jews long for peace and an end to the threats of suicide bombers; they long for a state where they can feel safe, a state of their own, where they are protected from persecution and hate crimes. The Palestinians long for restoration of their lands—a country without walls and checkpoints and travel permits, a country where they can live in their homes without fear of eviction and bulldozers.
For the residents of Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of occupied East Jerusalem, the threat of eviction is a daily reality. Their story is reported this week in ei, the Electronic Intifada news. "’We are like the roots of a tree. The Israelis may cut us in places, but we will never die. We will not be transplanted from Jerusalem. I will not leave this house,’ Maher Hanun tells a crowded room of Palestinian community members supported by Israeli and international solidarity activists. Hanun is one of 51 residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in occupied East Jerusalem living in two housing units that are facing imminent eviction by Israeli authorities….
The people living in these housing units, belonging to the al-Ghawe and Hanun families, are due to be forcibly removed from their homes this week….The courts have justified these evictions by saying that the land that the houses are built on is disputed. Yet, the houses were built under a joint construction project by the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) and the Jordanian government in 1956, 11 years before Israel occupied East Jerusalem. The houses were given to the families, both made refugees in 1948 after Palestinians living in what became the state of Israel were expelled and dispossessed during what Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe.Now these families are threatened with another Nakba. Israeli settlers that have moved into Sheikh Jarrah have falsified documents claiming ownership of the land. The Hanun and al-Ghawe families have presented their legitimate documents and an Israeli judge has not yet ruled on the legality of these papers. Yet the eviction orders are still proceeding, even though no official decision has been reached as to whom the Israeli courts recognize as the true owners.Both the Hanun and al-Ghawe families were forcibly evicted once before in 2002….” Read more….
April 10, 2009
John 18.1-19.42
“We have no king but the emperor.” (John 18.15)
There is a contest going on here, between those who uphold the status quo and those who want something different—the people of Israel, living under the occupation of the Roman army want new life. The temple authorities were an integral part of the power structure that ruled Palestine in the first century. This is how it worked: the Roman governor left much of the governance to the king, Herod, and the temple authorities. So long as they could keep the peace and the taxes coming in, the Romans were happy, their army well provided for. Because he wanted to keep the Romans happy, Caiaphas had said earlier that it was better to have one person die for the people (John 11.50). Someone had to preserve order and Jesus, with all his parading through Jerusalem on the donkey, was riling the people up as they shouted “Hosanna” and cried out for freedom.
The present-day occupants of Jerusalem and its surrounding towns also cry out for new life. The Jews long for peace and an end to the threats of suicide bombers; they long for a state where they can feel safe, a state of their own, where they are protected from persecution and hate crimes. The Palestinians long for restoration of their lands—a country without walls and checkpoints and travel permits, a country where they can live in their homes without fear of eviction and bulldozers.
For the residents of Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of occupied East Jerusalem, the threat of eviction is a daily reality. Their story is reported this week in ei, the Electronic Intifada news. "’We are like the roots of a tree. The Israelis may cut us in places, but we will never die. We will not be transplanted from Jerusalem. I will not leave this house,’ Maher Hanun tells a crowded room of Palestinian community members supported by Israeli and international solidarity activists. Hanun is one of 51 residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in occupied East Jerusalem living in two housing units that are facing imminent eviction by Israeli authorities….
The people living in these housing units, belonging to the al-Ghawe and Hanun families, are due to be forcibly removed from their homes this week….The courts have justified these evictions by saying that the land that the houses are built on is disputed. Yet, the houses were built under a joint construction project by the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) and the Jordanian government in 1956, 11 years before Israel occupied East Jerusalem. The houses were given to the families, both made refugees in 1948 after Palestinians living in what became the state of Israel were expelled and dispossessed during what Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe.Now these families are threatened with another Nakba. Israeli settlers that have moved into Sheikh Jarrah have falsified documents claiming ownership of the land. The Hanun and al-Ghawe families have presented their legitimate documents and an Israeli judge has not yet ruled on the legality of these papers. Yet the eviction orders are still proceeding, even though no official decision has been reached as to whom the Israeli courts recognize as the true owners.Both the Hanun and al-Ghawe families were forcibly evicted once before in 2002….” Read more….
A member of the al-Ghawe family stands beside a poster inside his threatened house in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
O God, your cross reminds us that your suffering is the way of the world. As we look upon your cross today, help us to be bearers of the suffering of others—in our own neighborhoods and on the other side of the world. Amen.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Footwashing Love
Holy Week
Maundy Thursday, April 9, 2009
John 13.1-17, 31b-35
“Just at I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Today we commemorate Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. April 9 is also the commemoration of the death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the commemoration of the massacre at Deir Yassin in 1948, just before the end of the British Mandate. Deir Yassin was an Arab town west of Jerusalem, which happened to be in the way of the Israeli militias as they removed Arabs to make way for the state of Israel.
If you have 33 minutes, watch the video—with pictures of Deir Yassin today, written accounts from 1948, and survivors, historians and researchers telling the story: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=341600202419569830
The Deir Yassin web site also tells the story:
“Early in the morning of April 9, 1948, commandos of the Irgun (headed by Menachem Begin) and the Stern Gang attacked Deir Yassin, a village with about 750 Palestinian residents. The village lay outside of the area to be assigned by the United Nations to the Jewish State; it had a peaceful reputation. But it was located on high ground in the corridor between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Deir Yassin was slated for occupation under Plan Dalet and the mainstream Jewish defense force, the Haganah, authorized the irregular terrorist forces of the Irgun and the Stern Gang to perform the takeover.
In all over 100 men, women, and children were systematically murdered. Fifty-three orphaned children were literally dumped along the wall of the Old City, where they were found by Miss Hind Husseini and brought behind the American Colony Hotel to her home, which was to become the Dar El-Tifl El-Arabi orphanage.
Part of the struggle for self-determination by Palestinians has been to tell the truth about Palestinians as victims of Zionism. For too long their history has been denied, and this denial has only served to further oppress and deliberately dehumanize Palestinians in Israel, inside the occupied territories, and outside in their diaspora.
Some progress has been made. Westerners now realize that Palestinians, as a people, do exist. And they have come to acknowledge that during the creation of the state of Israel, thousands of Palestinians were killed and over 700,000 were driven or frightened from their homes and lands on which they had lived for centuries.”
Deir Yassin is regarded as the turning point—the beginning of the Nakba, the “catastrophe”—the massacre created a panic and terrified Palestinians fled from villages all over the land that was to become Israel. Between 1947 and 1951, more than 400 Arab villages were vacated and/or demolished. The Nakba continues today, as Palestinians are still losing their homes and lands.
To read a more detailed account of what happened at Deir Yassin, see: http://www.deiryassin.org/shimontzabar.html, an account of what happened at Deir Yassin from Dr. Me'ir Pa'ill who was a member of the Knesset in the 1970s, representing the Meretz party. In April 1948, he was known as Colonel Me'ir Pilavski, a liaison officer representing the Palmach in the headquarters of the Haganah Israeli forces in Jerusalem.
A year later, the Jewish town of Givat Shaul Beth was built partially over the ruins of Deir Yassin. Today the site of Deir Yassin lies in suburban Jerusalem, 1500 meters north of Yad Vashem, the Israeli holocaust museum.
Read an article by Anis Hamadeh about the Deir Yassin massacre, comparing it to the attack on Gaza in December. About the author: http://www.anis-online.de/1/cv.htm
O Lord God, your Christ tied an apron around his waist and washed the feet of his followers, showing them his way of love and peace for the world. Help us, who profess to be Christ’s followers, to show your way of love to the world with acts of servanthood. Amen.
Maundy Thursday, April 9, 2009
John 13.1-17, 31b-35
“Just at I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Today we commemorate Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. April 9 is also the commemoration of the death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the commemoration of the massacre at Deir Yassin in 1948, just before the end of the British Mandate. Deir Yassin was an Arab town west of Jerusalem, which happened to be in the way of the Israeli militias as they removed Arabs to make way for the state of Israel.
If you have 33 minutes, watch the video—with pictures of Deir Yassin today, written accounts from 1948, and survivors, historians and researchers telling the story: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=341600202419569830
The Deir Yassin web site also tells the story:
“Early in the morning of April 9, 1948, commandos of the Irgun (headed by Menachem Begin) and the Stern Gang attacked Deir Yassin, a village with about 750 Palestinian residents. The village lay outside of the area to be assigned by the United Nations to the Jewish State; it had a peaceful reputation. But it was located on high ground in the corridor between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Deir Yassin was slated for occupation under Plan Dalet and the mainstream Jewish defense force, the Haganah, authorized the irregular terrorist forces of the Irgun and the Stern Gang to perform the takeover.
In all over 100 men, women, and children were systematically murdered. Fifty-three orphaned children were literally dumped along the wall of the Old City, where they were found by Miss Hind Husseini and brought behind the American Colony Hotel to her home, which was to become the Dar El-Tifl El-Arabi orphanage.
Part of the struggle for self-determination by Palestinians has been to tell the truth about Palestinians as victims of Zionism. For too long their history has been denied, and this denial has only served to further oppress and deliberately dehumanize Palestinians in Israel, inside the occupied territories, and outside in their diaspora.
Some progress has been made. Westerners now realize that Palestinians, as a people, do exist. And they have come to acknowledge that during the creation of the state of Israel, thousands of Palestinians were killed and over 700,000 were driven or frightened from their homes and lands on which they had lived for centuries.”
Deir Yassin is regarded as the turning point—the beginning of the Nakba, the “catastrophe”—the massacre created a panic and terrified Palestinians fled from villages all over the land that was to become Israel. Between 1947 and 1951, more than 400 Arab villages were vacated and/or demolished. The Nakba continues today, as Palestinians are still losing their homes and lands.
To read a more detailed account of what happened at Deir Yassin, see: http://www.deiryassin.org/shimontzabar.html, an account of what happened at Deir Yassin from Dr. Me'ir Pa'ill who was a member of the Knesset in the 1970s, representing the Meretz party. In April 1948, he was known as Colonel Me'ir Pilavski, a liaison officer representing the Palmach in the headquarters of the Haganah Israeli forces in Jerusalem.
A year later, the Jewish town of Givat Shaul Beth was built partially over the ruins of Deir Yassin. Today the site of Deir Yassin lies in suburban Jerusalem, 1500 meters north of Yad Vashem, the Israeli holocaust museum.
Read an article by Anis Hamadeh about the Deir Yassin massacre, comparing it to the attack on Gaza in December. About the author: http://www.anis-online.de/1/cv.htm
O Lord God, your Christ tied an apron around his waist and washed the feet of his followers, showing them his way of love and peace for the world. Help us, who profess to be Christ’s followers, to show your way of love to the world with acts of servanthood. Amen.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Blindfolded
Holy Week
Week of April 5, 2009
“Some began to spit on him, to blindfold him, and to strike him, saying to him, ‘Prophesy!’” (Mk 14.65)
Week of April 5, 2009
“Some began to spit on him, to blindfold him, and to strike him, saying to him, ‘Prophesy!’” (Mk 14.65)
painting is by Nabil Anan
It is hard for most of us to imagine being in this situation. We, who are privileged—white, middle class, straight—are unlikely to be falsely arrested, accused of crimes we did not commit or tortured into confessing. It does sometimes happen even in this country where we pride ourselves on the rule of law—but not often, and most assuredly not to us. Even if we are arrested, we do not expect to be spit upon, tortured, or mocked by the police. Our privilege protects us from such dangers.
Most of the people of the world do not enjoy such privilege. On yesterday’s news I heard an audio tape of a 17-year-old young woman in Pakistan being publicly flogged by members of the Taliban, who rule the town of Swat without restraints. She was flogged because she had rejected a marriage proposal from a Taliban fighter, who later saw her walking with another man. French police have been accused of unlawful killings, beatings, racial abuse and excessive use of force, mostly against ethnic minorities and foreign nationals. In Myanmar pro-democracy activists and prisoners of conscience, Hla Myo Naung and Min Ko Naing are suffering without proper medical treatment; one is in danger of completely losing his eyesight, having already gone blind in one eye whilst in detention after being denied specialist medical treatment. And even our own soldiers guarding prisoners at Guantanamo have been accused of beating the prisoners in their charge.
That's why so many people, even non-Christians, identify with the torture and humiliation Jesus received from the temple authorities and the Roman guards. It is why even Muslim artists painted Jesus on the cross for an art competition, "Christ in a Palestinian Context," in Bethlehem in 2002. The crucifixion was what spoke most convincingly to them about Jesus' ministry. Christ's experience was theirs.
April 28, 2004 - A detainee at an ad-hoc roadblock outside the village of Huwarra. His handcuffs were very tight and were only loosened at the request of B'Tselem staff.
Photo credit: Eliezer Moav, B'Tselem
March 31, 2002 - Arrested Palestinians being guarded by IDF soldiers during Operation Defensive Shield. Photo credit: Osama Silwadi, © Reuters
Both images are from B'Tselem, the Israeli Center for Human Rights
O God, your cross speaks to those who suffer humiliation and death at the hands of the powerful. Help us, your followers, to carry your message of the cross to the people in pain in our world today. Amen.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
She Has Done What She Could
Holy Week
Week of April 5, 2009
Mark 14.1-15.47
“She has done what she could” (Mark 14.8)
The Jesus portrayed in the gospel of Mark is concerned that his disciples take up the cross and follow in his way. This is what he takes great pains to explain to them. While they are bickering about who will be first and who will sit next to Jesus and how much money is being wasted on expensive ointments, Jesus keeps calling them back to what is needed, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant…” (Mark 10.39).
The disciples are to follow in the way Jesus has shown them—to do what Jesus has done…heal the sick, comfort the afflicted, cast out demons. To do what they can to bring about the reign of God, to be signs of God’s intentions for the world—to bring God’s mercy and justice to the world.
This is what the unnamed woman with the alabaster jar of nard does for Jesus. She does what she is able to do with what she has been given. And this is the good news. It is what all of us can do—what we are able to do. With respect to the injustices being suffered by Israelis and Palestinians, we cannot all do the same things. Rachel Corrie traveled to Gaza and stood in front of a bulldozer, trying to prevent a home from being demolished. Jeff Halper travels all over the world telling about the expansions of settlements while Palestinian homes are demolished in the same Palestinian neighborhoods. Dennis Healy has been the captain of the Dignity on several recent voyages to break the blockade of Gaza and bring medical supplies, humanitarian aid and international visitors to witness and report what they have seen in Gaza.
The farmers of Jayyous, a village I visited in the West Bank last June, are doing what they can—this week they are planting trees as a way of demonstrating against the Israeli security wall which has been built between their village and their farmlands, and against the permits needed to travel between the village and the farmlands: http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10448.shtml
The photo shows two farmers from Jayyous planting a tree.
We cannot all do what Rachel and Jeff, Dennis and the farmers if Jayyous are doing, but we can do whatever it is that we have been given to do—read the news about what is going on in occupied Palestine, write letters and send emails and visit our elected officials, telling them what we have learned. We can talk to our friends and neighbors about what we have learned. In the U.S., there is a gaping black hole of accurate information about the lives of Palestinians; we are not paying attention. We often hear a great deal about the suffering of Israelis, but we do not hear about the suffering of the Palestinians. This is where each of us can make a difference, where we can anoint the suffering with costly ointment—for the healing of the world.
O God, in your suffering and death on the cross you showed us what it means to follow in your life-giving way. Give us the strength and good courage to go out, bearing your name and your holy cross to the world you loved, even to death. Amen.
Week of April 5, 2009
Mark 14.1-15.47
“She has done what she could” (Mark 14.8)
The Jesus portrayed in the gospel of Mark is concerned that his disciples take up the cross and follow in his way. This is what he takes great pains to explain to them. While they are bickering about who will be first and who will sit next to Jesus and how much money is being wasted on expensive ointments, Jesus keeps calling them back to what is needed, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant…” (Mark 10.39).
The disciples are to follow in the way Jesus has shown them—to do what Jesus has done…heal the sick, comfort the afflicted, cast out demons. To do what they can to bring about the reign of God, to be signs of God’s intentions for the world—to bring God’s mercy and justice to the world.
This is what the unnamed woman with the alabaster jar of nard does for Jesus. She does what she is able to do with what she has been given. And this is the good news. It is what all of us can do—what we are able to do. With respect to the injustices being suffered by Israelis and Palestinians, we cannot all do the same things. Rachel Corrie traveled to Gaza and stood in front of a bulldozer, trying to prevent a home from being demolished. Jeff Halper travels all over the world telling about the expansions of settlements while Palestinian homes are demolished in the same Palestinian neighborhoods. Dennis Healy has been the captain of the Dignity on several recent voyages to break the blockade of Gaza and bring medical supplies, humanitarian aid and international visitors to witness and report what they have seen in Gaza.
The farmers of Jayyous, a village I visited in the West Bank last June, are doing what they can—this week they are planting trees as a way of demonstrating against the Israeli security wall which has been built between their village and their farmlands, and against the permits needed to travel between the village and the farmlands: http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10448.shtml
The photo shows two farmers from Jayyous planting a tree.We cannot all do what Rachel and Jeff, Dennis and the farmers if Jayyous are doing, but we can do whatever it is that we have been given to do—read the news about what is going on in occupied Palestine, write letters and send emails and visit our elected officials, telling them what we have learned. We can talk to our friends and neighbors about what we have learned. In the U.S., there is a gaping black hole of accurate information about the lives of Palestinians; we are not paying attention. We often hear a great deal about the suffering of Israelis, but we do not hear about the suffering of the Palestinians. This is where each of us can make a difference, where we can anoint the suffering with costly ointment—for the healing of the world.
O God, in your suffering and death on the cross you showed us what it means to follow in your life-giving way. Give us the strength and good courage to go out, bearing your name and your holy cross to the world you loved, even to death. Amen.
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