Before I begin today, I want to let you know that I am praying in solidarity with you on this sad day in U.S. history, when our Constitution was used to justify protection of the slaughter of millions of innocent children and the exploitation of their mothers. Let us all pray together that the Lord may convert the hearts of Americans, including most importantly the heart of our new leader.

Well, we had a midterm this week in our Reading the Scriptures in the Holy Land class, which focuses on the psalms. Due to my diligent studying (no comments from the peanut gallery,) I took a few days off from blogging. One of these days I’ll realize that it is easier for you and me if I do this daily.

Nebi Samwil

As you know, this land is considered holy by Christians, Jews, and Muslims. Many of the Old Testament prophets and leaders are revered by all three faiths, and where there is a birthplace or grave of one of these men, there will probably be clamoring as everyone tries to claim the spot. Nebi Samwil is one of those spots, as it is the tomb of Samuel, the last of the Old Testament judges who anointed Saul as the first king of Israel. There was a crusader church, but now there is building over it, with one side as a mosque and the other side as a synagogue. I’m sure it can be very contentious there at times.

The city itself is on the highest point in all of the Jerusalem area. On a clear day, which we didn’t have, you can see Jordan, the mountains of Galilee, and the Mediterranean Sea. Not a bad view when you get up in the morning, I would say.

Abu Ghosh (possible Emmaus)

This is the modern name of a town that is proposed as the first century location of Emmaus. There are about four towns that people claim are Emmaus, but this one, being about seven miles from Jerusalem, is the most likely. The crusaders believed this to be the case and built a simple, yet beautiful Romanesque church there. The interior surfaces were covered in paintings at one time, but now much has been worn off, and for some reason, many of the faces of the figures that remain have been removed. Anyway, we went there for Sunday morning chanted Mass with the French Benedictine nuns and monks that now live there. The acoustics of the space are really good (unlike the carpeted-wall monstrosities we built in the 50s and 60s,) and their chant sounded heavenly. It was a beautiful Mass.

Bet Guvrin-Maresha

These two ancient cities really have no historical significance that you would care about, and I wasn’t quite sure why we were there to begin with. As we were there, we were told that the highway from Tel Aviv (major airport) to Jerusalem (can’t land planes on hills) was going to be closed soon for the European Union delegates coming to do Gaza ceasefire talks with Israel. So, we had to move quickly, and our guide said we should go see the caves where they got chalk for concrete. I rolled my eyes and thought, what a pointless waste of time. Well, he knew what he was doing because there were enormous caverns of chalk. They were quite impressive.

Holy Sepulcher

On the 19th, we had Mass at 6am at the chapel in the Holy Sepulcher where Christ was crucified. It was a little early to fully appreciate the connection between what was being re-presented on the altar and what happened there 2000 years ago, but it was still a great prayer experience. After Mass, we did the Stations of the Cross through the Old City, with the tour guide giving explanations at a few points. Then he gave us a tour of the Sepulcher. It is the church, of course, that commemorates both the spot of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb where Jesus was laid and where He rose was not far away from Golgotha, so they could enclose both in the same crusader church. That church used to be bigger than it is, but much has been torn down. So much has been added on over the years with different styles that is now has a very unorganized, confused sense to it, but the circular nave around the sepulcher chapel is quite impressive with a massive dome. The church is now shared by six different Catholic and Orthodox churches, which as usual leads to problems. A few months ago monks from two different churches got into fisticuffs in the church, and someone of course video taped it and put it on Youtube. Nice.

The next day we went back to the Holy Sepulcher for 6am Mass in the sepulcher chapel, which is over the tomb of Christ. I had not been in this chapel yet, and I was scheduled to be the server for this Mass. Needless to say, I was so excited that my first time inside the chapel that commemorates the most important event in history was to serve a servant of THE Servant of God. It was a spiritually powerful experience.

Now, I did have a little gaffe. My mom had told me several times over the years that people always walk backwards out of the chapel, not wanting to turn their back on Christ. I thought this was universal, so as Mass ended I led the priest out, walking backwards. Even though I’m short, I still smacked the back of my head against the low marble doorway. Thanks Mom.

Yad Vashem

This is the holocaust museum in Israel, part of an enormous complex dedicated to keeping alive the memory of the six million Jews who lost their lives in the holocaust. I had been to the museum in Washington DC and to one of the concentration camps in Poland, but this was still a powerful experience. This museum had a lot of information about the ghettos, which was enlightening for me.

The controversial part was right at the beginning. There was a whole little movie about how the Christians were responsible for 1800 years of persecution of the Jews. There were also anti-Jewish quotes from St. Augustine in big letters as you enter the exhibit. I was a little defensive at first, but eventually I didn’t think it was too biased. The really controversial part was something I somehow missed. It was a picture of Pius XII with a quote about how he did nothing to help the Jews during the Holocaust. Though one might be able to say that he could have done more (though the complexity of the situation is unmistakable,) this description completely ignores the hundreds of thousands of Jews saved by Pius and other Catholics throughout Europe. Pope Benedict XVI, in negotiating his upcoming visit to Israel, made it a condition of his visit that Israel remove the picture and description. Israel rejected that and the other conditions he made, but he’s still coming. There are obviously bigger things in Israel that this government needs to change right now, and hopefully he can use his clout to get them to make some of those necessary changes, but it looks like the picture and description will stay.

The architecture of the museum was very effective, though I was skeptical when I saw the site model at the complex entrance. The museum is a long channel-like structure that cuts through a hill. The main side walls are large bare concrete walls that dramatically lean inwards. The main hall closes in on you as you walk through, and then forces you back and forth to view exhibits off of the hall. Then, after going through the exhibits and seeing an enormous circular space that houses thousands of binders containing the names and information of victims, you reach the exit. You walk out the glass doors and the walls that had been closing in on you dramatically widen, and you find yourself on a deck with an incredible view of Israel hillside. The building took you through the heavy burden of the holocaust in order to deliver you to this view which so clearly says, “This is Israel. This is Zion. This exists so that the Holocaust will never happen again.” Perhaps a little propaganda-ish, but it was very effective. I was impressed.

First Century Jerusalem Model

In the early 1960s, the owner of the Holy Land Hotel in Jerusalem hired an architect and archeologist to make a 1:50 scale model of what Jerusalem would have looked like in the first century, just before it was destroyed by the Romans in 70AD. It included the entire city within the walls, most impressively the temple that Herod the Great built before the turn of the millennia. It was an extraordinary model, which effectively gave you a visual sense of the make up of Jerusalem and the trajectory of the Holy Week events. I was in architecture school heaven. Of course, being me, I was down to my last two batteries, so I took about a third of the pictures that I would have with more batteries.

We didn’t see the model in the hotel, but rather it has been moved outside a few years ago to the Jerusalem Museum. In the same complex, there is an exhibit on the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Essene community that produced the scrolls in the first century AD. For those of you who might not know, these scrolls were discovered in 1947 in caves in near the Dead Sea. They contain information about the Essenes, but most importantly they contain full texts of nearly all of the Old Testament books. These texts were 1000 years older than any other full Old Testament codex.

Church of the Visitation and St. John’s Church

It isn’t stated in the Bible where Mary’s cousin Elizabeth and Zachariah lived, except that they were in the Judean hill country. The present city of Ain Karem is the place believed to be their home. Here they have two churches, one up a hill for the Visitation. The other is at the bottom of the hill, dedicated to the birthplace of St. John the Baptist. We are all a little curious why it is believed that the Visitation and the birth happened so far apart from each other, but when you consider that we don’t even know the town is certain, why worry about a detail like that.

I know you are sick of me saying this, but St. John is another one of my favorite saints. It was nice to pray in the church dedicated to his birth. The church wasn’t visually that stunning, and was covered with blue and white stenciled tile, like you’d find in a kitchen from the 1920s. The Church of the Visitation had some very impressive paintings.

I have to admit, embarrassingly, that the real highlight for me that afternoon was getting delicious gelato on the way out of the town.

Gethsemane

On our way back from the Church of the Visitation, we stopped on the Mount of Olives and had a holy hour at the Church of Gethsemane. This, of course, is where Jesus prayed to the Father that, despite His distress about enduring the Passion, He would endure it if it was the Father’s will. It is a profound place to meditate on Christ’s humanity. I hope to go back again at some point to spend more time in prayer.

Peter in Gallicantu

After Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas and the temple guard came and arrested Him. They took him to the house of Caiaphas, where He was kept until the next morning, when He was taken before Pontius Pilate. It was in the courtyard of this house that Peter denied Jesus three times. Gallicantu refers to the cock crowing after the denials.

There are a series of caves under the lower church here. It is believed that these were where Jesus was held overnight. It would have been a completely dark dungeon-like experience, probably matching well the sense of abandonment Christ must have felt. His Father was allowing Him to be tortured and killed. His friends abandoned Him. His closest friend denied even knowing Him. And now He was forced to contemplate all of this by Himself in a pitch dark cave. This too I hope to go back to for meditation.

I know this entry was long. Sorry, but thanks for enduring to the end.

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