Tag: Middle East

The Special Assembly and the Order of the Holy Sepulchre

Sunday morning, 10 October 2010, Saint Peter’s Basilica witnessed an extraordinary sight: All the bishops of the Catholic churches of the Middle East gathered around the Successor of Peter to concelebrate the Eucharist. The multicolored flowing robes, the variety of headdresses, and the diversity of accents gave eloquent testimony to the very nature of the Church, unity in diversity. The solemn ceremony opened the Special Assembly for the Middle East of the Synod of Bishops, an historic first convocation of the leaders of all the Catholic churches from Turkey to Egypt and as far east as Iran, including as well the region of the Arabian peninsula. Eastern bishops ministering to Middle East flocks in Western lands were there, as well as representatives of other Eastern Catholic churches, episcopal conferences and dicasteries of the Holy See. Other attendees included superiors general of religious orders, special nominees of the Holy Father, fraternal delegates of other churches, and invited experts and observers.
Every day for the next two weeks, all gathered in prayer every morning, celebrating each day according to a different liturgical rite and tradition, before spending all the morning and much of the late afternoon commenting on the draft working documents and offering heartfelt analyses of the situation of the Middle East churches and faith-filled proposals for their growth and development. It was a rare opportunity in the Vatican to hear the Arabic language widely spoken — in addition to Italian, French or English — as the synod fathers spoke their minds and opened their hearts to describe the challenges faced by their minority Christian faithful in the overwhelmingly Muslim world of the Middle East.
Cardinal John Patrick Foley, beloved Grand Master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, a special nominee to the synod of the Holy Father, was an important participant. His role of leadership of the Order with its mandate to support the Christian presence in the Holy Land almost corresponded to the mandate of the synodal assembly itself, for in the broadest sense “Holy Land” almost can be identified with “Middle East.” The lands touched by the Lord Himself include all of Israel, Palestine and Jordan and parts of Lebanon, Syria and Egypt; the territories of the Bible also include Turkey, Cyprus, Iraq and Iran.
“As messengers of Christ’s peace, I am convinced that all of us must pray and work for peace in the Middle East — especially for a just and lasting peace between Palestine and Israel and among their neighbors,” the good cardinal said in his first synodal intervention. “As the one honored by our Holy Father with the task of serving as Grand Master of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, I am inspired by the interest and generosity of the almost 27,000 Knights and Ladies of the Holy Sepulchre in 56 jurisdictions all over the world. Many have made pilgrimages to the Holy Land where they have visited not only the places made sacred by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ but also the parishes, schools, and hospitals which serve those we call the ‘living stones’— the Christian descendants of the original followers of Jesus Christ in that land we call ‘holy.’”
When Cardinal Foley concluded, “May these common [Jewish, Christian, and Muslim] beliefs and practices be acknowledged and followed in the hope of greater mutual understanding and of reconciliation, peace, and indeed love in that land which all of us, Jew, Christian, and Muslim, are moved to call ‘holy,’” he echoed the great, common theme of the synod, Communion and Witness. The deliberations and resolutions of this historic assembly were first concerned with the situation of Christians in the Middle East, the challenges facing them — ranging from political conflicts, freedom of religion and conscience, the evolution of contemporary Islam, emigration, and immigration of Christians to the Middle East from other parts of the world — and the response of Christians in daily life.
A profound reflection on ecclesial communion — “Now the company of those who believed were on one heart and soul (Acts 4:32) — was the next great concern of the synod fathers. At root it names our common participation in Christ’s death and resurrection and in the mystery of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church. The Middle East bishops spoke lovingly of building closer ties among the Catholic churches, especially among the diverse Eastern Catholic churches themselves and with the great Western church of Rome. The importance of common bonds of discipleship with the Orthodox and other churches and ecclesial communities was signaled as the next of the broadening circle of relationships in the Spirit that are the essence of church. In spite of the personal experience of discrimination in their homelands of so many of the synod fathers, all spoke of the vital importance of fellowship with other believers in the One God of Abraham, Muslims and Jews.
The concluding reflection of the synod articulated a profoundly evangelical position of faith, hope, and charity — a total confidence in the Divine Providence that has nurtured a “little flock” in the midst of so many challenges and difficulties and that has also entrusted it with a demanding vocation and call to give testimony in service to humanity, society, and each of the Middle East countries.
Committed to working to prepare a new dawn for their homelands and energized by their spiritually rich and fruitful days together in prayer, reflection, and study in union with the Pope, the patient and persevering shepherds of the Eastern lands left Rome to pick up anew their demanding roles of pasturing their hardy flocks in those sometimes rocky and arid lands entrusted to them.


2 June 2011

Caught in the Middle – Homeland Isn’t Always Home

The Middle East is the homeland of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Jews feel at home in one part of it. Muslims feel at home in most of it. Increasingly, Christians do not feel at home at all.

Once and Former Lords

Recently, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz published a story, “The Absentee From 6 Molcho Street,” an interview with Claudette Habesch, Secretary General of Caritas Jerusalem. She reminisced about the house where she was born and spent her childhood, which is now occupied by an elderly Jewish lady. Mrs. Habesch’s family was caught away from Jerusalem during the first Arab-Israeli war. After the cessation of hostilities, she and her family were never allowed to return to their home.
Most Middle East Christians understand her feelings. They recall with pride and nostalgia that once most of the lands of the Middle East were Christian. They also recall their influence, role and wealth — which was often disproportionate to their numbers.
After Christianity became the religion of the Roman Empire 17 centuries ago, the lands we now know as Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Cyprus, Israel, Palestine and Jordan were filled with churches, monasteries and shrines. These dynamic centers of Christian life and thought were organized into the four great patriarchates of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem.
As the Arab followers of the Prophet Muhammad conquered and occupied the lands once under Rome, Christians gradually became the minority — though a very important and influential minority — in what became an overwhelmingly Islamic Middle East.

Foreigners in Their Own Land

Christians, though second-class citizens in Islamic societies, were esteemed as “People of the Book” and, for the most part, learned to live with their Muslim overlords and neighbors.
The Crusades changed that. For the first time, in the name of God, Christian militias from the West invaded the heartland of the Middle East, seeking to reclaim it from Islam. Though sometimes harassed and victimized by the Crusaders, local Christians were nevertheless associated with the invaders — because of their shared Christian faith — by the Muslim community. Consequently, they were perceived as allies of the enemy.
In later centuries, Middle East Christians looked increasingly to the West, confiding in Western powers to protect them and emulating many of the West’s ways.
In modern times, Middle East Christians often traveled to the West, sent their children to schools there, adopted Western styles of dress and customs, and even studied and spoke Western European languages in preference to their native ones.
Their links to the West aggravated their position during the 20th century. With the post-World War I dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire by the victorious Western powers, the United Nations partition of Mandate Palestine, and the invasions of Iraq, extremist Muslim political movements have become increasingly more hostile to the West — and that hostility has been increasingly directed at their Christian Middle Eastern confreres.

Confusing Religion with Nationality

From ancient times, religion — in the sense of the assemblage of ceremonies, customs and rites of worship with its ministers and teachers — was regulated by the ruler or governing authority.
Jesus’ instruction to his disciples to “repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God” planted a seed of challenge to this social understanding of religion. However, it is only in relatively recent times that this seed has flowered into new values such as separation of church and state and freedom of conscience, worship and religion.
Not surprisingly, through much of the world and almost the entire Middle East, ethnic and national identities have been linked to religion, and ethnic and national rivalries and hostilities are inappropriately labeled as religious.
In varying degrees, almost all countries of the Middle East are culturally and religiously Islamic, ranging from the militantly secular Turkey to the militantly religious Saudi Arabia.
The modern State of Israel is religiously and culturally Jewish, but internally divided by a similar wide range of religious understanding and practice.
Most of the island of Cyprus is thoroughly Greek Orthodox, while Lebanon represents an anomaly in the Arab cultural world with its carefully delineated sharing of power among Christians, Sunnis, Shiites and Druze.
Middle East Christians now live in an overwhelmingly Judeo-Islamic world. Their continuing challenge is to find ways to integrate themselves and their faith more fully into the majority cultures of Middle East societies and to “de-Westernize” their religious customs and practices, yet in complete fidelity to their identity as disciples and followers of Jesus.

Finding Common Ground

In October 2007, 138 distinguished academics, jurists and religious teachers from the worldwide Muslim community addressed an open letter to Pope Benedict XVI and other Christian leaders concerning the common ground between Christianity and Islam. The document, with its quranic exegesis, identified love of the one God and love of neighbor as common and core values for Islam, Christianity and Judaism.
This bold initiative prescinded from emphasizing national and cultural differences, plunging directly into the great common core of faith and belief among the children of Abraham.
Often, this is precisely what does not happen in the Middle East. Local Christians, Muslims and Jews tend to be imprisoned by their respective historical memories and traditions. They constantly call attention to their differences and distinctiveness. They radically misunderstand each other’s religious language.
For example, there are verses in the Quran that deny Jesus as the Son of God, seemingly misconstruing Christian belief. Yet, Muslims venerate Jesus as son of Mary and make no reference to a human father — which is a departure from typical Islamic culture, which is decidedly paternal. Muslims and Christians touch on the same incomprehensible mystery of Jesus’ origin and paternity, but with mutually unintelligible ways of speaking about it.
An earlier Islamic call for finding common ground came from the late Sheikh Ahmed Kuftaro, Grand Mufti of Syria, who at the end of the 20th century called upon the followers of the great messengers of heaven, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, to be in solidarity in confronting the urgent problems and moral issues of today’s world.
Another challenge for Jews, Christians and Muslims, all of whom seek to follow the will of the one and the same God and aspire to be in his presence forever (which implies being together forever), is to begin to collaborate in realizing this great goal of solidarity now.
These inclusive understandings of faith among the children of Abraham pose radical challenges to the exclusive understanding of faith that is characteristic of traditional Middle East societies — especially theocratic Muslim societies, the relatively theocratic Jewish society of Israel, and local Christian communities.
The concept and value of a religiously pluralistic society is of relatively recent experience in the West and is still new to most traditionally Christian Western countries as well.

Defending the Faith

After the fall of the Iron Curtain more than 20 years ago, the churches of Eastern Europe reconnected with the rest of the world, but were handicapped by a defensive mentality and a dated ecclesiology.
Historically, the churches of the Middle East also have been defensive, confronting the social pressures of a dominant Islamic culture, resisting the political pressures of increasingly more militant Muslim movements, and seeking to safeguard their ancient rights and privileges.
The Middle East’s Orthodox churches are even more vulnerable to political pressures than its Catholic churches, since their origins as state and national churches make them traditionally subordinate to the political governing authority. Catholics, to the contrary, have more independence from civil control, fruit of the long history and experience of the Western churches and their international dimension.
The role of the Maronite Church in Lebanon — especially its patriarch — is unique among the Middle East’s churches.
Because of this tangled web of culture, ethnicity, nationality and religion, over the years Middle East churches have been more focused on maintaining their unique, separate identities and safeguarding their institutions than on developing a mature, personal faith understanding and commitment among their members.
Far too many Middle East Christians still consider themselves more as members of a tribe or social group bound together by distinctive customs and traditions than as members of a band of disciples guided by the spirit of Jesus.
Also, a missionary and evangelizing dimension of Christian life in the Middle East is necessarily very underdeveloped because of the constraints placed upon all the churches and their members by the political societies in which they live.
The painful past and present experiences of Middle East Christians have shaped their responses to persecution and discrimination. The forced displacement of Armenians, Chaldeans and Greeks, the death of some 1.5 million Christians between 1915 and 1923, and the chaos and random violence of Iraq have often led to a “circling the wagons.”
Lebanon was created by the French to be a Christian enclave; the call for a Christian homeland in Kurdistan is an echo of a similar mentality, paradoxically not unlike the rationale for the State of Israel.
Historically, separation has not proven to be an adequate methodology to ensure the survival of Middle East Christians — or, for that matter, to resolve the vexing and persistent political problems of the region.

The Churches in Their Diversity

The homelands of Christianity have an incredible diversity of ecclesiastical jurisdictions, rites and customs, most dating from ancient times when all the lands were Christian.
Consequently the Middle East has an overabundance of hierarchs compared to most of the Christian world, but relatively few priests and religious and increasingly fewer faithful.
For example, the (Latin Catholic) archbishop of Cologne, Germany, shepherds more than 2.1 million faithful; the (Melkite Greek Catholic) archbishop of Lattaqiya, Syria, tends a flock of 10,000.
Most would agree that there are too many ecclesiastical circumscriptions; however, pride in their historical roots and rivalries among them make reducing their number through suppression or consolidation problematic.
Even so, apart from some reservations regarding contemporary Egypt, ecumenical relations among all the churches of the Middle East are optimal. Except for a lack of agreement about how the bishop of Rome should exercise his special ministry for safeguarding and nurturing the unity of the universal church, the divisive doctrinal matters of earlier centuries among most of the churches have been resolved.
Some churches have taken major steps toward unity. For example, in Damascus the Orthodox patriarchate of Antioch and the Melkite Greek Catholic patriarchate of Antioch have been exploring models of collaboration and unity, even to the point of constructing shared parish churches.
However, full communion has not yet been achieved locally, even though it is much desired, especially because of the solidarity of the various Middle Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches with their not-yet-fully-united mother churches and worldwide brethren.
In many, if not most, countries of the Middle East, the Christian laity feels far less constrained in this regard than the clergy. Full participation in the worship of other churches is not uncommon and most inter-Christian marriages regularly follow the church and rite of the husband.
Most Christians are pleased with the Jordanian practice of celebrating Christmas according to the Latin custom and Easter on the day of Orthodox calculation and would be happy to see this as universal practice.

Leaving Home

The Christian percentage of the population of almost all the countries of the Middle East — the oil-rich Gulf states are notable exceptions — as well as the total number of Christians has been steadily diminishing since the 19th century.
From the dispassionate view of the sociologist, this is a long-term trend inexorably leading toward fewer Christians and inevitably resulting in the loss of that critical mass necessary for the long-term viability of these ancient communities.
Some pessimistically have described this modern decline of the Christian presence in the Middle East as the last stages of the displacement of the Christian Roman Empire by Islam.
Many factors are involved in the decline in Christian population. A significant socioeconomic factor is the difference in family size among contemporary Christians, Muslims and Orthodox Jews. Since Christian families tend to aspire to a high standard of living and education for their children, they have lower birthrates and tend to be smaller than many of their neighbors.
Further, in almost all the countries of the Middle East where native or guest-worker Christians exist, they are generally treated as second-class and are subjected to various forms of explicit or implicit discrimination in housing, employment and civil and military service — occasionally to the point of persecution.
War, terrorism, violence, injustice and poverty have prompted many native Middle East people — e.g., Iraq’s Christians — to relocate within their own countries, flee to neighboring countries or emigrate permanently.
The proportion of Christians among the displaced or emigrating is higher than among the general population — witness Iraq, Syria, Ontario, Michigan or New South Wales.
Christians have a greater affinity with most Western countries because of social and religious ties. Minority Middle East Christians also feel pressured by increasingly more militant Islamists in most Middle East countries — and in Israel feel doubly a minority, both as Arabs among Jews and as Christian Arabs among Muslims.
Generally, the churches historically rooted in the Middle East now have more of their faithful living in the Americas, Western Europe, and Australia than remain in their homelands.
Middle East Christians have taken root in these diaspora lands. They are alive and well and faithful to their traditions — only most do not live in their old neighborhoods anymore.

Sustaining the Christian Presence

When St. Paul wrote to the Romans, he appealed for assistance for the poor Christians of Jerusalem. Since ancient times, a similar concern has existed throughout the Christian world for the poor and needy of the church of Jerusalem, the Holy Land and the entire Middle East.
Most of the churches of the Middle East are not self-sufficient; their modest local resources are not enough to sustain and develop their operations and institutions. In addition to receiving permanent or temporary clerical, religious and lay personnel from abroad, these churches depend upon outside remittances and charitable assistance to sustain their institutional life and programs.
For example, in 1949 the Holy See established a special relief and development agency for the Middle East, the Pontifical Mission; Catholic churches around the world take up a special collection for the Holy Land every year; the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land has fund-raising networks sustaining its religious and charitable work in the Middle East; and the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem raises funds for the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the churches of the greater Holy Land.
Massive assistance also comes to the Christian communities of the Middle East from other worldwide networks of Catholic and Orthodox charities in addition to governmental aid to the general populations.
The charity of the Christian world to Middle East Christians is vital. The Middle East’s Christian communities may never be filled with youthful vitality again, but in its weakness and need it must not be denied life support from other generations of Christians around the world.

The Role of Middle East Christians

Those Christians who remain in the Middle have a potentially unique role to play — of being bridge builders to the future, especially for the Arab and Muslim worlds.
They have the capacity and mission of bringing the leaven of Christian-inspired values such as pluralism, separation of church and state, and freedom of worship and conscience to their countries, most of which remain relatively culturally isolated from the Western and modern worlds.
Christians can also contribute to the advancement of Middle Eastern countries through their advocacy for respect for God-given human dignity and inalienable rights; by their promotion of reconciliation and forgiveness; and by involving themselves in peacemaking initiatives at local, regional, national and international levels
Their ties to the West, which often personally handicap Middle Eastern Christians in their homelands, can also facilitate and expedite assistance from the West to the growth of these homelands, whether Arab, Israeli, Kurd, Persian, or Turkish.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place

The ancient West Bank city of Hebron houses a shrine built over the cave of Machpaleh, the burial place of Abraham and the patriarchs. Until 1967, the interior of the building was used as a mosque; now a large part is a synagogue. There is an uneasy peace between adherents of the two Abrahamic faiths and much contention about who controls the sanctuary.
Look closely at the architecture of the building housing both Jewish and Muslim worship areas and you will discern a Gothic church dating from the Crusader period — yet Christians have no cultic presence there nor hold any part of the shrine. This symbolizes the Christian situation, caught in the middle between Jew and Muslim, Israeli and Palestinian, almost invisible to both and yet vested in both sides.
Today, the most destabilizing and contentious issue for Christians and all the peoples of the Middle East is this unresolved relationship between Israelis and Palestinians. Both peoples aspire to possess the same small land; both are ambivalent about their use of violence; and both seem consistently to miss opportunities to reconcile their differences.
In her book The March of Folly, historian Barbara Tuchman questioned why governments so often pursue policies contrary to their own long-term interests, despite the availability and knowledge of feasible alternatives.
This favoring of short-term political interests at the expense of long-term best interests characterizes most of the national policies at play in the Middle East today, not only those of Israel and Palestine.
For example, the uneasy confessional balance in Lebanon has prompted agreement among Christians, Sunnis, Shiites and Druze to leave unresolved the status of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in United Nations refugee camps there, in spite of some recent improvements regarding capacity to work lawfully in the country.
Meanwhile, Israel maintains its ambivalence about settlement growth in the occupied Palestinian territories — and with rare exception presumes that a “settlement,” generally an urban development, must be exclusively Jewish and cannot be shared.
Palestinians are internally divided among themselves. In Gaza, they continue to nurture a militant and impractical religious ideology, which still foments terrorism against Israel — tweaking the tail of the tiger as it were.
Several countries espouse policies of massive retaliation and brute violence, paradoxically in the cause of making peace — and frequently presume that internal control to the point of injustice and discrimination ensures domestic tranquility.
Minimally, peace is a cessation of war and violence. But it is also an opportunity to forge new, positive relationships among former enemies. The theological basis for peacemaking is the truth about human persons — that the one God created each individual and endowed each one with inalienable dignity and rights.
Peacemaking is a Christian imperative. Jesus blessed peacemakers, calling them children of God. Peacemaking requires understanding the other. It calls for not being put off by differences but emphasizing what we have in common. It establishes links and connections, makes common cause and persists in maintaining communication.
Above all, peacemaking requires abstaining from revenge and retaliation, while seeking reconciliation and forgiveness. Ultimately, as Jesus taught, it demands the almost impossible — love of enemies. It can be learned and it is achievable with the help of God.
Christians in the Middle East may be relatively few, but their continued presence, their existential witness, their bridge-building across the abysses of division, and their peacemaking are vital to the well-being of all the peoples of the Middle East.


(Published in one, 36:5, September 2010)

Responses to the Preliminary Questionnaire

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN THE MIDDLE EAST:
COMMUNION AND WITNESS.
“Now the company of those who believed
were of one heart and soul” (Acts 4:32)

INTRODUCTION

1. Do you read Scripture individually, in your family or in living communities?

The personal degree of interest in and knowledge about Scripture varies widely in the Middle East.
Traditionally, it is Protestant and Evangelical Christians who emphasize the importance of Scripture in the life of the Church; historically it has not been a major emphasis in Orthodox and Catholic churches, with the exception of Egypt. Probably because of the impact of Presbyterian missionaries in Egypt, the Coptic Orthodox Church places a great emphasis on the Scriptural formation of its clergy and people. Catholic churches need to improve the Scriptural formation of their clergy and integrate preaching and teaching the word of God into the life of local parishes and communities.
Scripture is part of the region’s history. Thus the people of the Middle East cannot read Scripture without a certain bias. The Old Testament in particular is often misunderstood as though it was Israeli propaganda. The image of Israel as God’s chosen people over against the crushing of other nations, particularly Egypt, provoked many to ask, “Why does God favor Israel and not us? Why are we excluded from God’s love?” Accordingly, it is important to teach the historical development of Scripture, with a special emphasis on the relations between the Old and New Testaments.

2. Does this reading inspire the choices you make in family, professional and civic life?

The impact of Scripture upon the lives of individual Middle East Christians varies widely. For many Scripturally better educated Christians and Christian lay leaders, it has a powerful effect upon the decisions of their daily live and their choice of careers and service in their communities.
Middle East Christians live in a culture that still espouses values directly opposed to the Gospel such as revenge, honor killings, even cheating for the sake of the tribe, clan, or family. Christians need to understand that they must live “counter cultural” lives: to understand that forgiveness is at the heart of the Gospel message and to practice it in a Judeo-Islamic world where discrimination, humiliation, injustice, violence, and war are endemic.

CHAPTER I
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN THE MIDDLE EAST

3. What are the Churches doing to support and encourage vocations to the religious and contemplative life?

During the last decade, different Catholic churches in Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt, particularly the Maronite and Melkite Greek Catholic, have created “Vocation Committees” headed by the local bishop with specialized priest as members who encourage vocations through seminars, social gatherings, summer camps, and participation in social and pastoral work with parish priests. Some Catholic media provide special vocational promotion programs.
The Catholic churches in the Middle East have a strong seminary formation system. Minor seminaries are still important, and the quality of major seminary formation is generally very good. Political considerations impede the movement of students across frontiers and boundaries, especially in and out of Israel and Israeli-controlled Palestinian areas.
Isolated communities of contemplatives, often with foreign personnel, have been developed in several places with some success; however, generally there is not a great deal of interest nor encouragement of the contemplative life.
Although monasticism is a historic characteristic of the Eastern churches, the nurturing of monastic communities is no longer characteristic of the churches of the region, with the exception of the Coptic Orthodox. The Coptic Orthodox Church is distinguished by the importance of its monasteries which usually serve as active centers of clergy formation and lay training.

4. How can we contribute to the improvement of the social environment in the various countries in our region?

Education is the best and most effective tool to improve the social environment. Experience has shown that children and young adults from different religions and churches who attend the same educational institution grow to have better understanding and tolerance of each other’s religious beliefs and social life. In addition to educational institutions, the other social service institutions of the churches such as orphanage, homes for the elderly, clinics, and hospitals, usually assisting people on the basis of need, not creed, make a powerful contribution and witness to the majority societies of the region which are not Christian. Many churches also have programs of popular education, vocational training, literacy, family awareness, youth and women empowerment, and leadership formation.
Historically, the Christian churches of the Middle East have tended to adopt a defensive and withdrawn posture vis-à-vis Islam. Further, Christians have tended to isolate themselves, sometimes with an attitude of superiority, as wealthier and better educated with ties to and identification with the developed countries of the West; this, in turn, has nurtured an erroneous impression that Christians are foreigners to the region.
Local Christians need to emphasize that they are native citizens with ancient historic roots in the region, predating Islam, and not a product of Western colonialism. They need to assert their role in ensuring each country’s independence, development, and progress and participate in programs and projects of interreligious understanding and Christian-Muslim and Christian-Jewish dialogue.

5. What is your Church doing to assist, with the necessary critical eye, in dealing with contemporary ideas in your societies?

The churches play an important role in keeping a balance between modernization and religious life in the Middle East. Catholic schools and universities run by religious congregations keep up with modernization through the development of their curricula while maintaining a solid relationship with pastoral education. Many of the churches, also, have pioneered and been very active in developing programs and centers for treating contemporary problems, especially drug addiction.
A particular contemporary challenge for Middle East churches and Christians is to give priority to engagement in the struggle for justice and peace in the region as an integral component of Christian life and responsibility. Churches have an important role to play in peace-making. Christian faith and the teachings of Jesus call for Christians to be advocates of mutual understanding, communication and dialogue, forgiveness, and reconciliation.
Middle East Christians need to acknowledge that they have contributed to the tensions in the region, ask forgiveness from those around them, and become more proactive in building better religious, social, and political relationships with their neighbors.

6. How can respect for freedom of religion and freedom of conscience be increased?

Respect for freedom of religion and conscience can be increased by providing venues for individuals and communities to clarify the meaning of these freedoms, by encouraging interreligious dialogues, by focusing on commonalities rather than differences, by enhancing peaceful collaboration between religions, and by developing stable and prosperous societies characterized by respect, tolerance, and mutual comprehension.
Freedom of religion and freedom of conscience are values increasingly strongly espoused by the Catholic Church since Vatican Council II, but still remain foreign to most Middle East societies. Religious freedom is usually controlled and limited by government authority; the degree and style of religious freedom varies from country to country. Turkey and Lebanon are the only countries of the region without an established state religion. Muslim countries having varying degrees of tolerance of Christianity and do not allow conversions to Christianity; many have controls upon both Christian and Muslim religious freedom and practice because of fear of Islamic radicalism. Increasingly Christians are being discriminated against and in some situations persecuted.
Respect for freedom of religions can be enhanced on the government level by clear and strict laws favoring respect for human rights and freedom of religious practice and prohibiting discrimination and oppression. National dialogues and education programs about other religions in public and private schools are also needed.

7. What can be done to stop or slow the emigration of Christians from the Middle East?

Political instability and oppression, economic hardship, discrimination, and increasing Muslim and Jewish extremism are factors prompting Christian emigration from Middle East countries in addition to the opportunities in other countries and social and family ties to them.  Christian emigration cannot be stopped but in can be slowed by the provision of affordable housing and employment opportunities. Christian churches and church organizations should encourage Christians to be integrated into the society of their countries and assist them to remain through the creation of housing and income generating programs, including small business loan schemes.
Christians need to be encouraged to engage in more leadership roles in their societies, joining the armed forces, police, and civil service and to be forceful in opposing discriminatory legislation and practices.
Special attention needs to be paid to young people, especially those in the age groups at highest risk of emigration.  Encouragement of participatory church membership and involvement in community affairs by churches and parish communities is a high priority.  Church educational institutions and programs play an important role in providing quality modern education and vocational and professional training.

8. How can we follow and stay in touch with Christians who have emigrated?

The concern of the churches in the Middle East must place the well-being of their members over their own self-interest. This means, if necessary, the support of emigration and assisting their members to prepare for emigration and resettlement in other countries.
The presence of ecclesiastical jurisdictions and appropriately trained clergy of Eastern churches in the countries of immigration is necessary to support immigrants in their language and culture leading to their integration into their new societies. Where such jurisdictions do not exist, they need to be established; further, they need to be in full communion and collaboration with their respective mother churches in the Middle East.
Modern technologies facilitate communications throughout the world. News and support networks need to be increasingly developed, which requires up-to-date information acquisition, storage, and display—i.e., databases with data on Christian emigrants and their current situations.
Emigrants should be encouraged to keep in touch with their home-country communities, to provide assistance to them, and to promote better understanding and political relations with their home countries.

9. What should our Churches do to teach the faithful respect for immigrants and their right to be treated with justice and charity?

In varying degrees, all Middle Eastern countries are experiencing the movement of peoples so characteristic of the modern world, although only Israel is constituted as a country of immigration. War and violence have provoked massive flights of people from their homes, especially in Palestine, Cyprus, Lebanon, and Iraq. Discrimination and poverty have prompted further internal movements of peoples in the region. Many countries invite and welcome guest workers from within and outside the region. Churches should advocate public awareness programs, especially through Catholic and Christian media, to enhance knowledge of, respect and justice for, and acceptance of immigrants and their welcome into local communities and parishes.

10. What is your Church doing to provide pastoral care for Catholic immigrants and to protect them against abuse and exploitation by the State (police and prison officers), by agencies and employers?

Local churches in many countries provide special Masses and ministries for immigrants, pastoral care, legal counseling, and special care and vocational training for imprisoned immigrants. Pontifical Mission provides a variety of programs to support Catholic immigrants, including funding for youth centers, Sunday schools, and catechetical programs, and maintains two libraries providing study facilities and special programs for immigrants.

11. Do our Churches work to train Christian executives to contribute to the social and political life of our countries? What could they do?

Some of the region’s Catholic universities have degree programs and continuing adult education programs that develop lay leadership, especially in the social sectors through the training of health care professionals, teachers, catechists, and legal professionals. In several countries, there is a strong emphasis on the development of youth groups and youth leadership through Catholic secondary schools and parishes.
Generally, the Christian churches of the Middle East are very traditional in their structures and leadership, depending on priests and religious to exercise professional and leadership roles. A systematic development of lay leadership and lay formation programs by church institutions is lacking, apart from church sponsored colleges and universities preparing students for professional careers.
Although historically Christians have been proportionately well represented in movements and the struggle for independence in the Middle East, there are hardly any church-sponsored programs for the preparation of lay Christians for roles in public and civil service, government, and public administration nor any attempts to collaborate with institutions in other countries with well-developed programs in these sectors.

CHAPTER II
ECCLESIAL COMMUNION

12. What does communion in the Church mean?

Communion in the Church implies communication on the level of faith; sharing and emphasizing common beliefs, devotions, practices, and resources; and building and expressing community. The ideal of communion is unity amid diversity, rooted in the common identity of Christians as followers of Jesus Christ.
Generally the Eastern churches are relatively small, with a disproportionate amount of clergy and hierarchy. Their historical relationships have been dominated by rivalries—between Orthodox and Catholic, among individual Orthodox and Catholic churches, even among Latin jurisdictions and religious communities; however there have been some positive ecumenical movements, especially between the Greek Orthodox and Melkite Greek Catholic churches and between the Chaldean church and the Assyrian Church of the East.
In many parts of the Middle East, Christian laity easily mix, intermarry, and attend and share sacraments in one another’s churches. Also, there is a good level of collaboration among most Christian churches regarding social issues and in the provision of social services.
Occasionally different Christian churches share the use of church buildings and centers for divine worship, in addition to the sharing of educational and health care facilities and programs.

13. How is communion manifested among the various Churches of the Middle East and between them and the Holy Father?

In most of the Middle East, there are national or regional councils of Catholic hierarchs as well as ecumenical councils of churches. In many cases, political, social, and economic pressures have stimulated increased collaboration and communication among the different churches. The Pope, as successor of Saint Peter with a special charism and ministry of unity, is universally respected in the region, welcomed everywhere as the preeminent Christian spokesperson, and accepted by all Christians as the first of patriarchs and bishops and as head of the Latin Church.

14. How can relations among the various Churches be improved in the areas of religious, charitable and cultural activity?

Relations can be improved through the sharing and coordination of resources, including schools, home for the elderly, church buildings, universities, housing projects, and the like; through interfaith dialogue and common prayer; and through collaboration in works of community development, justice, and peace.
Besides the local native church communities and parishes, there are many other language groups and communities of Christians in the region. Generally, there is little contact between the local churches and these foreign and expatriate Christians. Yet often these very foreign and expatriate Christians and their communities can play an important role for the revitalization of the local church; many are associated with international renewal movements.

15. Does the attitude of “Church people” concerning money pose a problem for you?

Yes. Many “Church people” in the Middle East forget about some church teachings and Christian values once they get to a position of power and control; there have been many reported cases of corruption in Christian institutions. Also many “Church people” are bad managers of funds and financial resource either knowingly or because of ignorance and lack of preparation and training. The same lack of professional training often leads them naively to depend on spurious, opportunistic, and unreliable business counselors and church members. Frequently clergy compete in raising funds from foreign agencies, institutions, and churches for projects that are personal to them but that are not necessary nor represent priorities for the local church.
Many of the Eastern churches have too elaborate a “superstructure.” Per capita, there are more bishops, priests, and even religious in many parts of the Middle East than in most other parts of the world. A reduction in the number of dioceses and bishops should be carefully studied as well as the possibility of inter-ritual collaboration within a single jurisdiction.

16. Does participation of the faithful of your Church in celebrations of other Catholic churches pose a problem for you?

There is no problem whatsoever for Catholic faithful to attend one another’s churches, and the custom is widespread for Christian faithful, especially Catholic and Orthodox to do the same. However, the increasing presence of some Christian evangelical and fundamentalist groups and sects and the financial support and benefits they sometimes offer can undermine the traditional faith and observance of Catholics and Orthodox.

17. How can relations of communion among the various people in the Church be improved: between bishops and priests, people in consecrated life, lay-people?

Leadership in the church, whether exercised by bishops, priests, religious or laity must be rooted in Gospel values as a ministry or service. Historically, the conferring of quasi-civil authority on heads of churches during the Ottoman period has confused their role and distracted them from positions of spiritual authority. Additionally, the historical dependency of the churches of the Middle East on financing from foreign church and national sources has often further tempted and distracted Christian clergy from their spiritual and pastoral responsibilities. The greatest challenge is to build mutual trust, respect, and encouragement. An increasingly well educated laity need to have a greater role in the planning and execution of the activities of the churches, especially in the social sector. Priority needs to be given to building and developing persons, communities, and programs rather than construction of buildings.

CHAPTER III
CHRISTIAN WITNESS

18. Does catechesis prepare the young to understand and live the faith?

Although effective catechesis is very important, often it is handed over to personnel with inadequate preparation, even teenagers, who themselves need a better understanding of religion and faith. The low pay of teachers and catechists is an obstacle to recruiting and retaining them. Also, in many places, the priest is relatively unknown to the young, socially distant from the faithful, and more absorbed in finances and administration than pastoral care.

19. Do homilies respond to the expectations of the faithful? Do they help understand and live the faith?

In most of the Middle East, especially in the Arabic language sectors, there is an esteem for classical rhetoric with its extravagant vocabulary and emotional content; however this should not be the style of exposition of the Gospel message. Preachers—i.e., priests—are not well prepared for preaching; often the religious content of their message is more focused on restating church doctrines, customs, and disciplines then explaining them and less the on the teachings of Jesus and the values of the Gospel. Sermons do not give enough attention to the relation of Christian teachings to contemporary problems and challenges. Clergy themselves need a better grounding in Scripture and a better spiritual formation, as well as a practical development of effective communication skills.

20. Are Christian radio and TV programmes adequate? Would you like to see something else in your country? What programmes seem to you to be missing?

Although existing resources in some regions—e.g. Telelumiere television—are very good, they are not adequate to the needs of the entire Middle East. There should be at least one Catholic or Christian radio and TV station in every country and more programs attractively explaining the teachings of Jesus, the doctrines of the Church, and relations with other churches and religions in order to increase faith, understanding, and tolerance.
Secular media often are more dynamic and contemporary than the religious; however, they are often rooted in a value system that is antithetical to Christian teachings. The Christian media need to offer a corrective and bring balance to the impact of the news and political analysis, cinema, TV programs, and modern music, especially from Western and partisan local sources.

21. Practically speaking, how can ecumenical relations be promoted?

First, ecumenical relations can be promoted by considering the Church to be one but with internal divisions and separations rather than as a group of independent churches; in this perspective, the ecumenical challenge is to overcome separations and reconcile historical alienations, not to negotiate terms of relations between disparate organizations. Second, the well-established ecumenical principle should be followed of never doing separately what can be done together.
The Balamand declaration concerning the historical legitimacy of the various existing Eastern churches but renouncing proselytism as well as uniatism as methods of ecumenism in contemporary society should be observed by all the Christian churches and ecclesial communities.
Christians in each country and preferably throughout the entire region should agree on the dates of celebration of common major Christian religious holidays and observances.
Every Christian church and community should integrate ecumenism and intra-Christian understanding and collaboration into the faith life and activity of each local parish and community.

22. Does the re-discovery of a shared heritage (Syriac, Arabic and others) have some importance?

Knowledge of one’s roots is an indispensable component of identity and self-assurance. Greater dissemination of information about the Christian past and heritage of the entire Middle East and knowledge of the high points of Middle East Christian scholarship, achievement, and culture is needed. The absurd contemporary prejudices that identify Christians and Christianity as foreign to the Middle East need to be identified as such and systematically and carefully corrected; likewise Middle East Christians themselves need to nourish their identity and religiosity from their own historical sources and traditions and not look towards foreign and Western Christian traditions for their models.

23. Do you think the liturgy needs to be reconsidered to some extent?

The liturgy needs to become more appealing to youth, who are attracted by the enticement of Western media and modern technology. The Latin Church liturgy is radically simplified compared to most of the Eastern churches and in some senses is more adaptable and flexible. Traditional Eastern liturgies are more formal, elaborate, and longer, although they admit introducing use of modern vernaculars and more contemporary music. All liturgy involves ritual; appreciation of tradition and rituals needs to be taught and explained to every new generation.

24. How can we bear witness to our Christian faith in our Middle East countries?

The most effective way of bearing witness to our Christian faith is by letting our actions speak, more than our words. By living our Christianity faithfully and providing loving services to all people through our institutions and programs without discrimination and by showing solidarity among all the Christian churches and ecclesial communities, we give a powerful witness to what we believe and profess. The greatest witness of the churches is charity.
Additionally, it would be useful to educate the general public and Christians themselves about the contributions of Christians to their Arab societies in various fields such as the arts, politics, economics, and education and through a variety of service institutions.

25. How can relations with other Christians be improved?

Relations with other Christians can be improved by sharing religious holidays, celebrations, and social services; by accepting the baptism of other Christian churches and communion in other Christian churches; and by demonstrating solidarity with Christians in other countries throughout the Middle East and the world. They can also be improved by:
– undertaking ongoing dialogue and exchange that is frank and speaks to the religious traditions that unite,
–opening centers for ecumenical encounters and joint academic and intellectual discourses and publications,
–subscribing to a policy of non-provocation that is in keeping with the religious tenets and traditions of mutual respect and acknowledgment, and
–developing mechanisms that monitor infractions of a religious nature and intervene to prevent the escalation that may result from these infractions.

26. How should we regard our relations with Judaism as a religion? How can peace and the end of political conflict be promoted?

It is important to distinguish Judaism as a religion from the Jewish national movement, Zionism, that led to the establishment of the State of Israel. In the Middle East, this is very difficult since so many political and ethnic factions and groups wrap themselves in a mantle of religion, whether Jewish, Christian, or Muslim. Religious relations between Jews and Catholics have been well defined. Historically, Christianity is a developed form of Messianic Judaism; the practical challenge is to educate people to the commonality of their roots and seek to reconciliation and integration.
Christianity does not demand to be an established religion, even though Eastern Christianity enjoyed that status for a thousand years after the collapse of the Western Roman empire. The Church can live and function in a Muslim society and in a Jewish society. However, as followers of Jesus, Christians have a right and an obligation to work for justice, reconciliation, and peace.
Many Christians are hesitant to engage in a courageous struggle for justice and peace either out of fear and an unwillingness to risk or out of the mistaken understanding that justice and peace are merely political issues. Christians, especially, ought to be and frequently are advocates of mutual understanding, forgiveness, and reconciliation. They have a unique role to play in Middle Eastern societies, building bridges between Muslims and Jews, East and West.
A solution to the core problem of the region, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, lies in finding a formula to share what was once Mandate Palestine rather than to divide and separate it. The political and social methodologies of the past 62 years have been rooted in division and separation without success.

27. In what areas can we collaborate with Muslims?

The “A Common Word” initiative, developed by the Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and subscribed to by more than 138 Muslim scholars, clerics, and intellectuals, offers a platform for further efforts in developing Muslim-Christian collaboration. It calls attention to the fundamental common ground between Christianity and Islam and signals that the basis of collaboration between the three great Abrahamic faiths is their fidelity and submission to the will of the one God.
A “dialogue of truth” between Christians and Muslims—i.e., conversation about beliefs, practices, and theological systems—is not easy both because of the decentralized nature of Islam and the level of critical scholarship within the Islamic community.
A “dialogue of charity” between Christians and Muslims—i.e., practical collaboration in good works in the social sphere—is not only possible but long since underway. Christians can and do serve Muslims through their educational, health care, and other social service institutions; further they often make common cause with Muslims in affirming moral values relating, for example, to marriage, the family, and human sexuality.
In many of the conflict situations in the Middle East, Christians and Muslims often find themselves on the same political side, rooted in their sharing of a common culture and concerns.

CONCLUSION
What Is the Future for Middle Eastern Christians?
“Do not be afraid, little flock!”

28. Why are we afraid of the future?

Christians, especially in the Arab, Persian, and Turkish worlds, fear their increasing alienation from the mainstream society due to the relentless pressures of a kind of militant Islamic extremism that tends to demand their allegiance and conformity or, failing that, brands them as foreign to their native lands and society. Further, the civil authorities governing most of the Middle East countries are weak and unstable, often yielding to the demands of Islamic extremists at the price of the human and political rights of Christians and other vulnerable groups in their societies.

29. How do we incarnate our faith in our work?

We incarnate our faith in our work by being responsible and conscientious and by making career choices that consider not only our personal advantages but also how best to serve the needs of our churches, communities, and countries.

30. How do we incarnate our faith in politics and society?

The teachings of Jesus place demands upon the behavior of His followers that run contrary to many of the most popular ideas, values and movements of modern societies both in the Middle East and around the world. The challenge for individual Christians and the churches of the Middle East is to be faithful to the Gospel and the promptings of the Spirit and not to compromise their convictions for secondary and short-term political and social advantages.

31. Do we believe we have a specific vocation in the Middle East?

The Lord’s mandate to his disciples, “. . . you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth,” clearly includes and points to regions of the Middle East. Christians have special roles, first, of witness and, second, of mediation. Their faith and the Church can make a precise contribution to bringing together the disparate groups and interests that polarize and tear apart the region.

32. Any other comments?

In order to maintain a Christian presence and viability in the Middle East, the churches in the region, Europe, the Americas, and elsewhere are called upon to work closely together. Religious leaders must unite to develop a common agenda that aims at keeping their faithful in their homelands and ensuring that these centuries-old communities continue to function. The viability of Christian communities cannot be an egoistic and religiocentric concern; rather it is an enterprise that will ensure the kaleidoscopic nature of the social and religious makeup of the Middle East countries. It will also ensure that the indigenous Middle Eastern Christians will not end up only as expatriate communities in distant foreign lands.
Christians in many parts of the Middle East, especially in the core Holy Land, are too dependent on financial assistance from abroad. Each local church can only have a long-term future as a viable and reasonably self-sustaining community. In many parts of the region, the relatively easy availability of outside funding tempts church leaders to invest more resources and efforts in enterprises disproportionate to the needs and dimensions of their communities and that betray the Gospel principle that the followers of Jesus, “the little flock,” are called to serve.

Red Riders

When [the Lamb] broke open the second seal, I heard the second living creature cry out, “Come forward.” Another horse came out, a red one. Its rider was given power to take peace away from the earth, so that people would slaughter one another. And he was given a huge sword. (Revelation 6:3-4)

ISTANBUL — A bomb exploded in a crowded, downtown neighborhood during the afternoon rush hour today, killing eight people and injuring more than forty others. Victims included three teenagers returning from Quranic classes at a nearby mosque.

MARJEYOUN — Unexploded cluster bombs continue to be a major hazard in southern Lebanon. Since the cessation of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, fourteen persons have died accidentally in the Marjeyoun area, mostly farmers working their fields.

ARBIL — The violence of the recent explosion in this northern Iraqi town shocked people who felt themselves safe in the Kurdish-controlled area. The Chaldean patriarchal seminary had been temporarily relocated there because of the dangerous situation in Baghdad.

TEL AVIV— A Palestinian suicide-bomber blew himself up in a crowded shopping center on Friday afternoon. Preliminary estimates are that at least twenty-five people were killed and five shops were totally destroyed.

ZERQA — Jordanian authorities apprehended six young men, members of a cell of militant extremists who were planning an armed attack on tourists in Queen Alia Airport near Amman.

BAGHDAD — U.S.-led coalition forces swept through a densely populated Shiite neighborhood. Crossfire between Americans and insurgents killed several bystanders, including two children.

GAZA — The Israeli army continued its air strikes against Hamas infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, hitting at least eight different locations and taking aim at a rocket-launching cell.

TEHRAN — The Iranian government ignored the threat of a major expansion of international sanctions as it continues its program for the enrichment of uranium.

SDEROT — A rocket landed in the yard of a house in the Israeli border town of Sderot, wounding three civilians, while another hit a nearby factory. The Qassam Brigades claimed responsibility for these attacks.

FALLUJA — The growing confrontation between tribal leaders and Al Qaeda took a violent turn today when a suicide bomber drove into a crowd gathering for a funeral procession, killing at least twenty-seven people and wounding dozens of others.

After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue. They stood before the throne and before the Lamb . . . These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress . . . God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. (Revelation 7:9a, 14b, 17b)


(Published in
one, 33:4, July 2007)

Middle East Story

Maybe because I’m a native New Yorker, I really like the Leonard Bernstein/Stephen Sondheim musical, “West Side Story,” a contemporary adaptation of William Shakespeare’s “The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet.”
In the play (and film), two young people, María and Tony, with ties to two rival street gangs fall in love. The hatred between the gangs shatters both their lives.
In one song, Anita warns María:

A boy like that who’d kill your brother,
Forget that boy and find another,
One of your own kind,
stick to your own kind!

This could be the Middle East’s theme song. Don’t get involved with — don’t join forces with — don’t build relations with anybody except your own kind.
But, here’s the rub: Who are my kind?
If I’m a Lebanese named Ahmed, are my own kind fellow Muslims, but not Christians and Druze? Or are my own kind Sunni Muslims, rather than Shiites?
If I’m a Shiite, are my own kind only Shiite Arabs, or do they include Shiite Persians too?
If I’m a Shiite Arab in Lebanon are my own kind Hezbollah, but not fellow Shiites who are members of Amal?

Stick to your own kind!

If I’m a Palestinian called Nabil, are my own kind Christians, not Muslims and Jews? Maybe my own kind are Orthodox, but never Catholics and Evangelicals?
If I’m Orthodox, are my own kind just Greek Orthodox or Syrian and Coptic Orthodox too?

Stick to your own kind!

If I’m a Israeli named Esther, are my own kind Jews, as opposed to Christians and Muslims? Or, are my own kind Ashkenazi Jews, not Sephardic or Ethiopian?
If I’m an Ashkenazi Jew living in Israel, are my own kind Ashkenazi Jews from Austria and Germany, but not Jews from Russia?
If you keep this up long enough, it boils down to “If I’m me, I’m not you!”
It’s absurd. It’s illogical. It’s counter-productive. Even so, we pick and choose sides and groups, clans, and tribes — and then insanely let rivalry and hatred allow us to demonize the other and force us further and further apart.
It was the rabbi from what is now Turkey, Paul, who tried to persuade his fellow Christians, whatever their background, that

you are all children of God in Christ Jesus . . . There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free person, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

May the Middle East story not always be about shattered lives nor conclude like the Shakespearean tragedy:

A glooming peace this morning with it brings.
The sun for sorrow will not show his head.
Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things;
Some shall be pardon’d, and some punished;
For never was a story of more woe . . .


(Published in
one, 32:5, September 2006)

A World of Difference

Why did you do it? Why did you decide to change the name of Catholic Near East magazine?
Actually, our magazine takes its name from its parent organization, Catholic Near East Welfare Association — which is celebrating its diamond anniversary this year!
When Pope Pius XI established Catholic Near East Welfare Association on 11 March 1926, most of the words of its title had a different sense than they do today. To avoid potential misunderstandings, for several years we have been referring to the organization by its acronym, CNEWA.
To launch CNEWA’s 75th anniversary celebration, we thought this an auspicious occasion to echo that change in name with our magazine as well.
What could be misleading about the old name of our magazine?
First, “Catholic”. We certainly are a Catholic publication, and, to be specific, the publication of a papal agency. Our inspiration is Catholic. One of the major purposes of our parent organization, CNEWA, is to support the Eastern Catholic churches — our magazine tells their stories.
But, CNEWA’s other mandates are to provide humanitarian assistance to those in need regardless of nationality or religion, promote Christian unity, and foster interreligious understanding and collaboration.
That’s why our magazine tells about all the people in the lands we serve, not only Catholics, but also other Christians — Orthodox, Protestants, Evangelicals — Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and even people of no religion at all.

Second, “Near East”. Originally, British foreign office usage divided Asia into the Near East, the Middle East, and the Far East. “Near East” referred to the countries lying east of the Mediterranean, mostly in southwest Asia. It was not a precise designation. Sometimes it extended from western Greece around to western Egypt. Sometimes it included all the Balkans.
“Middle East” was often used to refer to countries further east than the “Near East”, up to but not including Pakistan and India. Today the one term, “Middle East”, is commonly is used for both.
(The division of the Mediterranean world into east and west is a usage dating to the Roman Empire.)
When CNEWA was founded, the Holy Father’s mandate was to assist the peoples and churches under the jurisdiction of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches and the Pontifical Commission for Russia — in those days, referring to the territory of the old Russian Empire.
That’s why its more accurate for us to speak of CNEWA serving the peoples and churches of the Middle East, Northeast Africa, India, and Eastern Europe — and Eastern Catholics everywhere.
That’s why, also, CNEWA’s magazine is not just about the “Catholic Near East,” but about all the different peoples and faiths of the world CNEWA serves — and about how we try to make a world of difference!


(Published in
CNEWA World, 27:3, May 2001)

When the Price Is Right

The first time I went shopping in Jerusalem was about 30 years ago. I vividly remember spending an entire afternoon in one shop, discussing quality, sipping tea, making and rejecting offers, feigning indifference and disinterest — in other words, bargaining, Middle Eastern style.
Usually it’s done like this: First of all, if you see something you’d really like to buy, never let on that you’re interested. After diverting the conversation to other matters, you cautiously may express some curiosity as to its price.
The seller probably will mention a figure at least double its value and his expectation. You, in turn, express an offer of no more than half of what it’s worth and what you intend to spend.
Then, the negotiations begin. It’s as much a match of wits and skill as any game of chess. The goal, of course, is to bring your opponent as close to your price as you can. The method is a series of reluctant compromises. The style, if you’re capable of it, is dramatic; the rhetoric, exaggerated and extravagant.
Of course, the whole exercise is futile if you don’t have a good idea of the thing’s value — both market conditions and what it’s worth to the seller personally.
In The Book of Genesis there’s a classic story of bargaining, which extols Abraham, the great ancestor of all the Semitic peoples. When God was about to destroy Sodom, Abraham interceded. He persuaded God to spare it for the sake of 50 innocent people, then 45, then 40, then 30, and then 20. Finally he persuaded the Lord to spare it for the sake of 10.
Abraham bargained with God and drove the price of Sodom’s salvation down!

Now, thanks be to God, Abraham’s children, with mixed mutual sentiments of hope and apprehension, finally have begun to talk to one another and negotiate solutions to their differences.
And, what are political negotiations but a specialized kind of bargaining?
It should be no cause for wonder, then, that their initial proposals to one another are impossible. No one really expects them to be taken entirely seriously. They’re meant to open the bidding — they ask for or demand far more than the proposer ever expects to settle for or receive.
As in all good bargaining, there may be exaggerated and extravagant rhetoric and dramatic contrivance and staging. But, behind it all, there is a mutual expectation of compromise.
The art and the skill of it, naturally, is to bring your opponent as close to your price as you can. In this match of wits and will, the style of the process may be as important as the result. Saving face sometimes becomes more valuable than success.
Of course, the whole exercise is futile if each does not have a fair idea of what the other can afford and is willing to pay.
Shopping seems much easier when you’re confronted with fixed prices — no hassle, no bother, no time wasted in bargaining. But, it can cost you a lot more, because you have no say about the price.


(Published in
Catholic Near East, 18:1, January 1992)

What’s Right?

“In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue . . .” It used to be that no one challenged passing on to generations of school children that Columbus discovered America. Now, we’re more nuanced. Columbus “discovered” America for Spain, but many peoples from Asia and voyagers from Europe had been there before him.
Many great discoveries in the world of mind and spirit are arrived at by different folk, but usually they become identified with one time, one place, and sometimes one person. Take, for example, the notion of inalienable human rights. It was “discovered” in the Middle East.
In the ancient Middle East, societies were structured around kinship groups such as the family, clan, and tribe. The group provided each of its members with identity and security. Outside the limits of each village or town, the lone individual was defenseless and helpless.
The price paid by the individual for the security of the group was complete acceptance of its ways and decisions, especially of its head, be it father, patriarch, or king. In the ancient world, human life simply was group life. No other way was conceivable or desirable.
Laws codified the ancient customs of these societies. They made clear what the individual’s obligations were to the group and the group’s obligations to the individual. I fulfill my obligations to the group and obey its customs and laws, and I expect everyone else to do the same.
This reasonable expectation that others would be bound equally to follow the ancient customs and laws that made social life possible is at the root of what we mean by a “right.”

One ancient Middle Eastern society had ways uniquely different from the others: Israel. Although ancient Israel’s customs and laws were much like those of its neighbors in practice, the Israelites had a different motive for following them.
In other societies, the basis for law was custom and the will of the ruler. In ancient Israel, the basis for law was the revealed will of God. The Sinai covenant between God and the people meant that every aspect of Israelite society was ordered and governed by God.
Since “rights” refer to the reasonable expectation that others will follow the customs and laws of society, in ancient Israel, “rights” became a religious matter. Rights are rooted in the will of God.
The whole teaching of the Hebrew scriptures supports and enhances this idea, from the story of creation. God created men and women “in his image.” Each human person has a fundamental dignity which comes from God.
Jesus taught the incredible importance of each person. In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus says the ultimate measure of our lives will be how we treated each one of “these least brothers of mine.”
No wonder then that, as heirs of the Judeo-Christian tradition, we speak of each person being endowed by his or her creator with inalienable rights. And, what danger for us, if we forget that these inalienable human rights come from God.


(Published in
Catholic Near East, 17:2, July 1991)

Love, Liberty, and Justice

In the code of legal holiness of the book of Leviticus, it states, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
St. Luke tells us that on one occasion Jesus was challenged to give his interpretation of this law of Moses, “And who is my neighbor?,” his challenger asked.
Jesus’ answer was a story, the story of a Samaritan who went to extraordinary lengths to care for an afflicted and half-dead Jew — his traditional enemy — whom he encountered on the desert road from Jerusalem to Jericho.
The meaning of the story is that our neighbor isn’t just our kind, the one next door; he’s anyone in need who crosses our path.
Usually we think of someone afflicted and in need in very tangible terms. How can I help bring food to the hungry, shelter to the homeless, or medical care to the sick?
But there are also needs and hungers of another order, needs and hungers of the spirit. Our neighbor may need schools, education, a place of worship, or instruction in faith. Above all else he needs respect for his fundamental God-given dignity as a human person and for the rights which flow from it.
The United States’ Declaration of Independence say it well:

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness . . .

Loving our neighbor includes respecting his fundamental human rights and helping him to achieve and safeguard them — it means doing all that we possibly can to achieve and safeguard justice and peace.
In their November statement, Toward Peace in the Middle East: Perspectives, Principles and Hopes, the bishops of the United States tackled head-on how to apply the teachings of Jesus to the tangled social and political situation of that troubled part of the world.
No, the bishops aren’t mixing up religion with politics. Politics is concerned with the practical, day-to-day decisions which make society function. The bishops are courageously challenging us with the fundamental principles needed for any political judgment.
Principles aren’t solutions; they are what make solutions possible. The principles the bishops affirm give a moral and spiritual foundation for the search for justice and peace in the Middle East.
The prophet Isaiah once described the work of the Messiah as “. . . he shall judge the poor with justice, and decide aright for the land’s afflicted.”
The Lord whom we hail as Messiah asks each of us to help bring justice and peace to those who suffer its lack.


(Published in
Catholic Near East, 16:1, January 1990)

Travel, Truth, and Trust

The old man gently told the story:

Abraham refused the idolater the hospitality of his tent because the idolater refused to accept Abraham’s God . . . But, his God rebuked Abraham: “All these years I have given this man life, health, and my loving care. And you will not offer him food and shelter for even one night!”

The simple tale of the Grand Mufti of Syria, Sheik Ahmad Kaftaro, seems a fitting parable for the Middle East.
During July, I had the privilege of guiding Archbishop Roger Mahony of Los Angeles and Archbishop William Keeler of Baltimore on their fact-finding mission to Syria, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, and Egypt. Their task: together with Cardinal John O’Connor, to draft a new policy statement on the Middle East for U.S. bishops.
The most painful aspect of the trip was to listen to so many sincere and concerned people — simple village folk, educators and professionals, patriarchs and bishops, presidents and government ministers — and at the same time to encounter such profound distrust and misunderstanding. How often, deliberately or unwittingly, each would demand that the other accept his god, his absolute, alone.
For some, the larger conflicts had intimate, personal dimensions.
– In the Palestinian village of Nahalin, the young widow tried to find seats for each of us in her tiny, bare living room. Two little girls clung to her skirt, while, with her small deaf son in her lap, she told how her husband was killed by Israeli soldiers on his way to work.

– In the Israeli West Bank settlement of Alfey Menashe, Mayor Shlomo Kitani proudly showed us his gleaming, new little town. At the monument commemorating the tragic event, a young Jewish widower told us without rancor how his pregnant young wife and child were burnt to death when an Arab hurled a petrol bomb at his car.
We dropped into a clinic in Gaza where a seventeen year old was being treated for a bullet wound in his leg. With a spontaneous eloquence he spoke of being willing to die for his people’s freedom.
Prime Minister Shamir told us of how negotiations for peace must be conducted, President Mubarak spoke optimistically of the possibilities of peace, PLO leaders stressed the sincerity of their quest for a peaceful settlement.
So many different ideas, so many contradictory plans, so many hopes, so many fears…and, running through them all, so much misunderstanding and so much distrust.
There are no easy answers.
In fact, the greatest temptation is to say there can be no answers at all. Much of the area we visited was once the kingdom of Solomon. But, it takes a greater than Solomon to find a way to bring peace to the Middle East.
Please God, he will!


(Published in
Catholic Near East, 15:3, August 1989)