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I recently finished reading Blood Brothers, the biography of Elias Chacour, a Palestinian priest. It’s a roller-coaster ride that takes you from his childhood as a refugee, to his time studying abroad, to his challenges in parish ministry and political activism. When I finished it I couldn’t help but feel a sense of sadness as he pleaded with Western Christians not to judge his people. After all, it’s what we do right? I’ve seen many churches that have Israel’s flag next to a cross or their national flag, but I’ve never seen a church with a Palestinian flag in it. I’ve heard many Christians proclaim a deep love for the people of Israel, but I can’t remember the last time I heard Christians proclaim a deep love for the Palestinian people. Are not Palestinians made in the Image of God too? Did Jesus not die for them just as he died for “Jew and Gentile”? Does God not love them? I doubt any reasonable Christian would deny that God loves the Palestinians so why do we not show it? Why do we let them become God’s forgotten ones?
In my last post I urged people to not get fooled by simplistic
narratives of the conflict. One of the most famous of these is that the
conflict is an unavoidable conflict when Jews and Arabs/Muslims, East and West.
But this narrative is challenged by the fact that in the early 1900s, Jews and
Arabs had a fairly peaceful coexistence in Palestine. The narrative also
ignores the 200,000 strong Christian community in the Holy Land.[1]
Palestine is home to a rich diversity of Christians across
many different denominations, including the Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Anglican,
Lutheran, and Baptist denominations. Of particular significance is the Melkite
church, one of the world’s oldest denominations tracing its origins back to the
church in Antioch (Acts 11).
In British Mandate Palestine (before the formation of Israel)
it is believed that 15-20% of Palestine’s population was comprised of
Christians. However that number has steadily decreased down to just 4% today.
Most experts attribute this decline to the Christian population emigrating
because of the difficulties in day-to-day life caused by the conflict, in
particular the massive exodus that occurred during the 1948 war.[2]
In fact, it is believed that 56% of Palestinian Christians make up the
Palestinian Diaspora.
Alongside the difficulties that many Palestinians in the
West Bank face, Christian churches (and Muslim mosques) have often been the
target of threats, vandalism, and arson by Israeli settlers.[3]
These attacks are part of a tactic called “price tag attacks” where settlers
attack Palestinian civilian property or IDF personal in response to any
measures taken which they see to be against settlement enterprises. These acts
(along with the settlements) form a major barrier to peace in the region.
But there is an insidious challenge that Palestinian
Christians face from the Western church: in our support of Israel we have often
neglected our Palestinian brothers and sisters, or worse. In Blood Brothers,
Elias Chacour recalls an incident that happened when he was studying abroad in
France. A wealthy and influential member of his church invited him to a
Christmas dinner party where he was to be a special guest. He felt flattered
until he was introduced as a Jewish seminary student from Bethlehem (apparently
the host wanted to parade the “fact” that he had a Jewish believer celebrating
with him). When Chacour took his host aside and asked him why he had been
announced as a Jew and not a Palestinian, he was told that “You’ll get along
much better if you stop announcing to the world that you are Palestinian.”[4]
But Chacour’s story is not unique. Speaking in an interview
in the documentary film “With God on Our Side”, Palestinian Christian - and
Director of Musalaha - Dr.
Salim Munayer recalls his experiences in America.
“When you’re a Christian and you’re a minority you desire to be in contact and fellowship and relationship with Christians from other places. I do remember visiting a church in Dallas, and they said “we have a brother from Israel” and I spoke for a few minutes and after that people came to shake my hand. I still remember very vividly and distinctly one man came and said “Oh I’ve so longed to shake the hand of somebody from Israel, I love the Jewish people!” and I said yes great, I do love the Jewish people too but I am not a Jew I am a Palestinian. This man took his hand from my hand, turned around and left. I mean, and you experience that again, and again, and again. And you ask the question what’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with my Christianity? What’s wrong with this people? And you come to the conclusion that something is wrong with their theology. Their theology causes them to reject and object to a brother that doesn’t fit their end time theology. And that is a sin. ”[5] [emphasis added]
A common sentiment in the writings of Palestinian Christians
is that a lot of the pro-Israel nationalist rhetoric spouted by some Christians
is deeply hurtful to their Palestinian brothers and sisters. One such line of
rhetoric is that all the Palestinians must leave the land so that Israel can
have it. But I think this ignores that the purpose of the election of Israel
and God’s allowing them to dwell in His land was always to bless the other
nations and point them towards salvation. The land was part of God’s plan to
redeem all of Creation but it was never an end within itself.
It also ignores another very important concept found in
Galatians 3:28-29. I quite like how the theologian and philosopher Peter Rollins
paraphrases this idea:
“To identify with Christ, to pick up your cross and follow him means that your various identities, male, female, Jew, Gentile, slave, free … any of these identities do not follow define you. That those identities are robbed of their power and you enter into this space where you realise you transcend those identities; you’re not completely defined by them. And in that way we identify with others who have different beliefs and are part of different tribes to ours.”[6]
Here’s the thing: If your theology stops you from loving a
whole group of people then your theology is in serious need of rethinking.
Christ’s command to love one another calls for a type of love that affirms that
all humans have intrinsic value because they are made in the Image of God. And
this sentiment is found not just in the teachings of Christ but throughout the
Bible. The Biblical view of God’s plan is a renewing of this world where all
people are called to become children of Abraham by faith and anticipate their inheritance
which is “not Palestine, a small geographical strip in the Middle East… [but]
the whole renewed, restored creation… the whole world which is now God’s holy
land.”[7]
[2]
Palestinian Christians have historically been wealthier and better connected
than Muslim Palestinians, making it easier to emigrate.
[3]
Vandalism ranges from destruction of property to spray painting Settler slogans
such as “Arabs out”, “King David, king of the Jews. Jesus is Garbage”, or even
“Send Arabs to the gas chambers”.
[4] Elias
Chacour and David Hazard, Blood Brothers (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Chosen
Books, 2003), 112.
[5] With
God On Our Side, directed by Porter Speakerman Jr. (Rooftop Productions,
2010)
[6] Peter
Rollins, “Crucified Identities” (video), 21 May 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2_y_QM8yWw.
[7] Wright,
N T. Surprised by Scripture: Engaging Contemporary Issues. New York, NY:
HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, 2014, loc1416.
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