We’ve been so focused on issues and problems here at home in the U.S. that we’ve almost forgotten there’s a whole world out there where issues and problems not only exist but affect us here at home. Sometimes the list seems endless: Ukraine, Sudan, the war in Iran, violence in Palestine.
Radical Israeli “settlers,” determined to take over the land they call Samaria and Judea, or the West bank, continue to encroach into and attack Palestinian villages, often with the support of or not-so-benign neglect of Israeli soldiers.
Taybeh, a small Christian village of about 1340 souls, just 9 miles north of Jerusalem, faces many of the same problems as do other Christian villages on the West Bank. Last year the settlers set firen ext to its ancient cemetery and church, and the Israeli government is attacking its church and other charitable bodies by removing their tax-exempt status. This is the ancient place known as Ephraim where John’s Gospel tells us Jesus stayed after raising Lazarus. And our so-called Christian leaders say nothing.
Prayer for the Day
You created us, O God, as sentient beings
May we use our minds to think and question;
You gave us our hands as tools for work and play
May we use our hands for the good of your world;
Help us to live so we question injustice
And strive to establish your realm on earth.
In the name of the One who calls us to question,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
In the Holy Land, the crisis facing Christians is no longer confined to one battlefield, one political dispute or one act of violence. It is unfolding simultaneously through insecurity, displacement, economic pressure, legal uncertainty and the slow erosion of the conditions that allow communities to remain rooted in the land where Christianity was born.
Zenit News
Parents are unable to bring children who need regular medical treatment to hospitals. Sons and daughters cannot reach their elderly and sick parents. Fathers are stopped at roadblocks that prevent them from going to work. These are situations that have persisted for months, even years, in the West Bank.
Fr. Ibrahim Faltas, Head of Schools, Custody of the Holy Land
As a result [of the raising of Lazarus], Jesus stopped his public ministry among the people and left Jerusalem. He went to a place near the wilderness, to the village of Ephraim, and stayed there with his disciples.
The Gospel of John 11: 54