Real solidarity with the Palestinian church asks us to choose between institutional comfort and the kind of justice the gospel actually demands, the disruptive kind, the kind that costs something — as the Church of England recently discovered.
The Church of the Holy Sepulcher was built over the spots where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, buried, and rose from the dead.
As Israeli settler violence escalates in Taybeh, church leaders and organizations are working to give Palestinian Christians security, jobs, and community support to remain in the Holy Land.
‘For three years, the police saw me as a nudnikit (pest),’ said Yisca Harani, founder of the Religious Freedom Data Center, which tracks and aims to prevent incidents targeting Christians in Israel. ‘After the incident with the nun, I feel they are taking me a
‘The old city is not merely a residential area,’ the clergy said in a statement. ‘It is the historical and human heart of Tyre, home to thousands of civilians, including families, children, and the elderly.’
Restrictions imposed by Israel against large gatherings due to the Iran war is casting a long shadow on Easter celebrations, but Palestinian Christians may be feeling it most acutely.
Since hostilities erupted last month between Israel and Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group — in the shadow of the wider, U.S.-Israeli war on Iran — over 1,400 people have been killed in Lebanon, and more than 1 million have been forced to flee their homes.
He said God doesn't listen to the prayers of those who make war or cite God to justify their violence, just after Israeli police prevented the Catholic Church’s top leadership from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
In lieu of the Palm Sunday procession, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem called on Christians around the world to commit to a moment of prayer for the Holy City of Jerusalem.
The Iran war could be the final blow to Bethlehem’s tourism industry — and to the already-dwindling Christian population as well.