“O Little Town of Bethlehem”: Grieving the Ongoing Slaughter of Palestinians

Christmas Eve is just two weeks from today, and the popular Christmas carol “O Little Town of Bethlehem” will be sung in many Christian churches that evening. So, this is a fitting time to think about the ongoing plight of the Palestinians in Bethlehem—as well as in Gaza and the entire West Bank. 

“O Little Town of Bethlehem” was written by Phillips Brooks. In the decades following his ordination as an Episcopal priest in 1860, Brooks (1835~1893) became whom many considered the greatest preacher of his day. While still a young man, he delivered a eulogy for slain President Lincoln in April 1865.

Later that year, Brooks traveled across the Atlantic to Europe and then made a pilgrimage to Bethlehem. On Christmas Eve, he assisted at a service in the Church of the Nativity, built over the traditional site of Jesus’ birth. Three years later he wrote "O Little Town of Bethlehem" for the children of his church.*¹ 

In 2015, 150 years after Brooks visited Bethlehem, I visited there for the first (and only) time. I took the short taxi ride from the south side of Jerusalem to the West Bank wall (or “separation barrier”). That structure, often called the “Wall of Apartheid" by Palestinians, was completed in 2006.

With my U.S. passport, I was able to pass through the wall with no problem. After observing what I could there, I then took another taxi to the main tourist sites in old Bethlehem. I was rather unimpressed, though, by the Church of the Nativity and the commercialism of the surrounding environment.*²

 I soon decided to go to the central shopping area of the city where I walked up and down the streets, observing ordinary Palestinians going about their daily activities. I quickly noticed the considerable difference between them and the Israelis I had seen in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Despite their close geographical proximity, they seemed to be living in a different, much earlier, time period. And most of them were not free to exit Bethlehem and travel to Jerusalem. They were mostly prisoners confined to their own “little town” of fewer than 30,000 people.

That and my experiences the next day traveling in East Jerusalem and the West Bank territories sparked the drafting of “The Plight of the Palestinians,” my 6/30/15 blog post, which I encourage you to read (again) by clicking here.

The plight of the Palestinians is far, far worse today than it was in 2015. That is true for the West Bank, but extremely, and increasingly, worse for Gaza now, 430 days after Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

It is also bad again this year in Bethlehem. A recent article posted by Reuters is headlined, “Another bleak Christmas in Bethlehem….” The article includes an image (similar to the one above) of the creche created last year by the Lutheran Church in Bethlehem to depict the sickening rubble in Gaza.

And now, the situation there is so much worse. Just last week, Amnesty International concluded that Israel has committed and is continuing to commit genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip. Sadly, in the coming year, things may get even worse for both Gaza and the West Bank.

President-elect Trump has named Mike Huckabee as his choice for the U.S. ambassador to Israel. Last month, a Religious Dispatches post (see here), stated that Huckabee is a stalwart Christian Zionist who has made over 100 trips to Israel.

According to that article, “Huckabee has aligned consistently with the hawkish Israeli Right and its agenda of permanent occupation, expansion, and Jewish supremacy in Palestine.” 

The first verse of Brooks’s carol ends, “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in you tonight.” In Bethlehem now, the fears of most people are undoubtedly stronger than their hopes—and around the world, many of us grieve the ongoing slaughter of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

Then, the last verse concludes with the words “peace to all on earth,” which the angels sang on that first Christmas.*³ May God help us all to strive more diligently to make peace to all a reality in Bethlehem, Gaza, and everywhere across the globe!

_____

*¹ Click here if you would like to hear the carol being nicely sung. Also, here is a link to an informative piece, including several images, about Brooks written by the New England Historical Society.

*² A short time after his mother Helena visited Jerusalem and Bethlehem in 325–326 A.D., Constantine commissioned the construction of a church on the site traditionally considered the birthplace of Jesus.

*³ The wording of the original carol was updated in The New Century Hymnal (1995), cited above.

Note: “To Bethlehem” is a powerful new poem that begins “O little Town of Bethlehem / forgive us for the lie / our churches tell - that all is well / as Christmas Eve draws nigh.”  I encourage you to read the entire poem by clicking here. 

Who Are “My People”?

It has now been nearly six weeks since the horrific rocket attacks by Hamas on the nation of Israel and then the beginning of Israel’s retaliatory attacks on Gaza. There has been extensive death and destruction already, and there is no telling how long it will be before the violence comes to an end.

I have been grieving over this “war” from the beginning and finally decided to write this article, reflecting on the words “my people” and considering who are often, and who should be, designated by those words. 

Are contemporary Israelis God’s people? I have serious concerns about the primary stance of the U.S. government in relation to the current deadly conflict in Israel/Gaza, but I am dealing here primarily with religious rather than political aspects of this grave situation.

Online posts by conservative evangelical Christians, including some of my Facebook “friends,” indicate overwhelming support for the current nation of Israel, whose citizens are perceived to be God’s people just as the Israelites in Old Testament times were.

It is true that in the Old Testament God calls the Israelites “my people” over 200 times, and the words “my people Israel” appear over 30 times.

In Exodus 19:5-6, God says that the Israelites, who are being led to the “promised land” by Moses, “will be my most precious possession out of all the peoples” and that they “will be a kingdom of priests for me and a holy nation.”

Drawing from those words, I Peter 2:9 in the New Testament declares that now it is the Jesus-followers who “are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people who are God’s own possession” (CEB).

Partly on the basis of this highly significant verse, I believe God’s people today are not only, or primarily, the Jewish citizens of the modern nation of Israel or the Jews as an ethnic group.

And I am quite certain that the citizens of the nation of Israel today are not by any means the same as the Israelites whom God called “my people” in the Old Testament.

What does it mean for a Jewish rabbi to stand with “my people”? Recently, I had the opportunity to hear a local Jewish rabbi speak about the challenge that he and his congregation are facing at the present time.

There was, naturally, some reference made to the deplorable antisemitism that has increased in the U.S. since 10/7, which now has a very negative meaning to so many Jewish people as does 9/11 to most USAmericans.

At the end of his talk, the rabbi said, and repeated, “As for now, I stand with my people.” I took those words to mean that he was going to stand with (=support) the Israel Defense Forces in their retaliatory attacks on Gaza.

But a Christian pastor who knows the rabbi quite well took it differently. She thought he meant that he was going to stand with the people of his Jewish congregation who are incensed because of the Hamas attacks on Israel and perhaps grieving the death or injury of friends and/or family members there.

Certainly, a Jewish rabbi as well as a Christian pastor—and perhaps a Muslim imam—should be expected to stand by his or her congregants in times of stress, anxiety, and even anger.

Who should you and I consider to be “my people”? “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it (Psalm 24:1, NIV) is another single verse from the Bible that is crucially significant.

God may have called some people to a special task and referred to them as “my people.” But most broadly, shouldn’t all the inhabitants of the world be recognized as God’s people?

As Creator of “the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1), God surely sees all ethnic groups, adherents of all religions, and even all segments of society who have no religious faith of any kind as “my people.”

If we are God-believers, shouldn’t we be able to see that all eight billion people in this world are “my people”—God’s and ours—and seek to work tirelessly for the welfare of all, including the peaceful coexistence of Israelis and Palestinians? 

Is It Antisemitic to Criticize Israel?

Antisemitism has a long and sordid existence in world history. As is the case with all discriminatory language and actions, antisemitism cannot be condoned no matter when or by whom it is expressed. But neither can charges of antisemitism be used as a means to stifle legitimate criticism of the nation of Israel.

The Recent Ruckus

As has been widely covered in the news media over the past few weeks, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) has been accused of making anti-Semitic remarks that have upset many Congresspeople, among others, including some Democrats.

Some, though, understand Rep. Omar as voicing criticism of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and as not being antisemitic at all.

According to Merriam-Webster, “antisemitic” means “hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group.” There was nothing in Rep. Omar’s statements about the Jews. She spoke only with reference to the nation of Israel and its supporters.

(Of course, it clouds the picture that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has recently publicly stated that Israel “is the national state, not of all its citizens, but only of the Jewish people”—in spite of the fact that about 20% of the population are Arabs.)

Pro-Palestinian Pronouncements

President Jimmy Carter had considerable experience in matters directly connected to the Middle East. He made a vital contribution to implementing the 1978 Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt—which resulted in Menachem Begin of Israel and Anwar Sadat of Egypt being awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.

More than 25 years later, Carter wrote a highly controversial book: Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (2006). Carter and his pro-Palestine stance were castigated not only by many Jewish people but also by some Democrats (such as Nancy Pelosi) who were/are not Jews—and by many conservative Christians.

June and I read Carter’s book in 2007 and were convinced that his criticism of Israel was correct—but certainly not antisemitic.

A much-maligned Jewish group goes by the name Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). The JVP, founded in 1996, has, along with some other Jewish groups and many individual Jews, publicly voiced strong support for Rep. Omar.

JVP’s mission statement clearly states that JVP members “are inspired by Jewish tradition to work together for peace, social justice, equality, human rights, respect for international law, and a U.S. foreign policy based on these ideals.” 

What about BDS?

As perhaps most of you know, a movement known as BDS (boycott, divest, sanction) is a strong opponent of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people. I first heard about BDS  in 2015 when I was in Israel.

I ended my 6/30/15 blog article, “The Plight of the Palestinians,” with a positive introduction to BDS. I was disappointed, but not particularly surprised, when I was reprimanded by a local Jewish rabbi whom I considered my friend.

Rep. Omar (b. 1981) has said that her grandfather taught her about the history of racial oppression in South Africa. Consequently, she has compared Israel to an “apartheid regime”—which is what Carter did, in effect, in his 2006 book.

In a 2017 speech, Rep. Omar said she remembered her grandfather talking about apartheid in South Africa and how some people “decided that they were going to engage in boycotts of that government.”

And, as we know, by 1994 apartheid had ended in South Africa.

It seems to me that the BDS movement was organized for the same sort of purpose as the anti-apartheid activities in opposition to South Africa’s policies.

So, I am not critical of Israel and in favor of the BDS movement because I have negative, prejudicial attitudes toward Jewish people. My criticism of Israel is because of that nation’s ongoing and patently unjust treatment of Palestinians.

Is It Anti-Semitic to Criticize Israel?

Anti-Semitism has a long and sordid existence in world history. As is the case with all discriminatory language and actions, antisemitism cannot be condoned no matter when or by whom it is expressed. But neither can charges of antisemitism be used as a means to stifle legitimate criticism of the nation of Israel.

The Recent Ruckus
As has been widely covered in the news media over the past few weeks, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) has been accused of making anti-Semitic remarks that have upset many Congresspeople, among others, including some Democrats.
Some, though, understand Rep. Omar's voicing criticism of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and as not being antisemitic at all.
According to Merriam-Webster, “antisemitic” means “hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group.” There was nothing in Rep. Omar’s statements about the Jews. She spoke only with reference to the nation of Israel and its supporters.
(Of course, it clouds the picture that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has recently publicly stated that Israel “is the national state, not of all its citizens, but only of the Jewish people”—in spite of the fact that about 20% of the population are Arabs.)
Pro-Palestinian Pronouncements
President Jimmy Carter had considerable experience in matters directly connected to the Middle East. He made a vital contribution to implementing the 1978 Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt—which resulted in Menachem Begin of Israel and Anwar Sadat of Egypt being awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.
More than 25 years later, Carter wrote a highly controversial book: Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (2006). Carter and his pro-Palestine stance were castigated not only by many Jewish people but also by some Democrats (such as Nancy Pelosi) who were/are not Jews—and by many conservative Christians.
June and I read Carter’s book in 2007 and were convinced that his criticism of Israel was correct—but certainly not anti-Semitic.
A much-maligned Jewish group goes by the name Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). The JVP, founded in 1996, has, along with some other Jewish groups and many individual Jews, publicly voiced strong support for Rep. Omar.
JVP’s mission statement (see here) clearly states that JVP members “are inspired by Jewish tradition to work together for peace, social justice, equality, human rights, respect for international law, and a U.S. foreign policy based on these ideals.” 

What about BDS?
As perhaps most of you know, a movement known as BDS (boycott, divest, sanction) is a strong opponent of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people. I first heard about BDS in 2015 when I was in Israel.
I ended my 6/30/15 blog article, “The Plight of the Palestinians,” with a positive introduction to BDS. I was disappointed, but not particularly surprised, when I was reprimanded by a local Jewish rabbi whom I considered my friend.
Rep. Omar (b. 1981) has said that her grandfather taught her about the history of racial oppression in South Africa. Consequently, she has compared Israel to an “apartheid regime”—which is what Carter did, in effect, in his 2006 book.
In a 2017 speech, Rep. Omar said she remembered her grandfather talking about apartheid in South Africa and how some people “decided that they were going to engage in boycotts of that government.”
And, as we know, by 1994 apartheid had ended in South Africa.
It seems to me that the BDS movement was organized for the same sort of purpose as the anti-apartheid activities in opposition to South Africa’s policies.
So, I am not critical of Israel and in favor of the BDS movement because I have negative, prejudicial attitudes toward Jewish people. My criticism of Israel is because of that nation’s ongoing and patently unjust treatment of Palestinians.
[Addendum: On March 17, 2019, an op-ed piece by Rep. Omar was posted on The Washington Post’s website; her clarifying earlier statements as well as emphasizing the imperative for peace and justice in Israel/Palestine are most commendable.]
x

A White Politician, a Hispanic Activist, and a Distraught Palestinian Walk into the Ambassador Hotel

For of all sad words of tongue and pen,
The saddest are these: “It might have been!”

(John Greenleaf Whittier, 1856)

I couldn’t help but think of these well-known words when reflecting on the tragic events that happened in the first hour of June 5, 1968.

The White Politician

Robert F. (Bobby) Kennedy won the Democratic presidential primary in California on June 4, 1968. Late that night he walked into the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles to join many of his enthusiastic supporters for a vivacious victory celebration.

Just after midnight, Kennedy decided to call it a night. Hemmed in by the crowd, he followed the maître d'hôtel through the kitchen/pantry area of the hotel in order to exit by a back door.

RFK never made it out of the hotel on his own, for as he passed through the back kitchen area he was shot several times at close range. Rushed to the Good Samaritan Hospital (about ten minutes away), he died less than 26 hours later.

There is good reason to think that had he not been killed, RFK would have garnered the Democratic nomination for President in 1968.

In the November election, Richard Nixon just barely won the popular vote—and there is also good reason to think that he well may have lost the election if RFK had been his opponent.

“Of all sad words of tongue and pen . . . .”   

The Hispanic Activist

Dolores Huerta had enthusiastically welcomed Kennedy to California in March 1968. Although long overshadowed by Cesar Chavez, she and Chavez were the co-founders of the National Farm Workers Association in 1962 and was/is an indefatigable civil rights activist.

In an interview posted (here) just last month, Huerta (b. 1930) vividly recalled the day RFK joined thousands of farmworkers in Central California to celebrate the end of Chavez's fast for nonviolence.

Huerta happily walked into the Ambassador Hotel after the close of the California primary, and then stood on the podium with RFK as he gave his acceptance speech on that fateful night of June 4/5.

Huerta (on left) with RFK on 6/4/68

(If you haven’t seen the recent PBS documentary on Huerta, available for viewing here, I highly recommend it.)  

The Distraught Palestinian

Sirhan Sirhan was born (in 1944) in Jerusalem into an Arab Palestinian Christian family with Jordanian citizenship. When he was 12, his family emigrated to the U.S., moving to California after a brief time in New York.

On the night of June 4, 1968, Sirhan also walked into the Ambassador Hotel—but with a far different purpose than Kennedy’s or Huerta’s.

According to a reviewer of Mel Ayton’s book The Forgotten Terrorist (2007), “Sirhan Sirhan was not just a crazed 24-year-old Jordanian immigrant. He was in fact a radicalized Palestinian refugee with a clear political motive to attack the U.S. and its political institutions.”  

As a New York Senator, Kennedy had a large Jewish constituency. With the June 1967 Six-Day War fresh in the headlines, to Sirhan and many other Palestinians, Kennedy's unfortunate pledge to arm Israel seemed to be a declaration of war against the Palestinian people.

Sirhan was soon arrested and the following year was sentenced to death for assassinating Kennedy. With the change in California laws of capital punishment, in 1972 his sentence was changed to life imprisonment.

Surprisingly, a May 26 article in the Washington Post (here) is titled “Who killed Bobby Kennedy? His son RFK Jr. doesn’t believe it was Sirhan Sirhan.”

Regardless, the assassination of RFK is said to be the first major incident of political violence in the U.S. stemming from the Arab–Israeli conflict.

Again, sad words about what could have been so very different.

Sadly Remembering Nakba Day

You may not know what “Nakba Day” means, but every adult Palestinian in the world does. “Nakba” is the Arabic word for “catastrophe," and every year Nakba Day commemorates the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian people, mostly after the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948.

The Facts

The geographical area known as Palestine was under the civil administration of Great Britain from 1920, soon after the end of WWI, until 70 years ago. That oversight of the Palestinian territory came to an end on May 14, 1948, and the State of Israel came into existence the next day.

Even though the creation of the modern nation of Israel had the approval of the United Nations and the support of the United States, it was strongly opposed by the Arab neighbors of the Palestinian people, whose land and houses were overtaken by the Jewish citizens of the new country.

Consequently, the First Arab-Israeli War began on that very same day 70 years ago, May 15, and lasted for almost ten months.

More than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from their homes just before and during that war. About the same number of Jews moved into Israel during the first three years following the birth of the new nation. 

The Struggle

The tension/animosity/fighting between the Palestinian people and the Jewish citizens of Israel has continued for a full 70 years now.

Without a doubt, Palestinians have instigated much of that violence, and the violent activities of the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization), founded in 1964 and operating mostly in the West Bank territory, and the similarly violent activities of Hamas, founded in 1987 and operating mostly in Gaza, are widely known.

However, the reason behind that violence has not been adequately acknowledged or elucidated by the U.S. news media.

Last week June and I watched the documentary “The Occupation of the American Mind” (2016), and I highly recommend it. (It is available, here, on YouTube.) That film depicts the U.S. news media’s woeful lack of adequate/fair explanation of the plight of the Palestinian people and of the attacks on their territory (especially Gaza) through the years—in 1967, 1982, 1993, 2008, 2012, and 2014.

The 2014 Israeli attack on Gaza was the last major clash, resulting in about 2,250 Gazans killed and over 10,600 wounded. The number of Israelis killed in that armed struggle was around 1/31 of the number of Palestinians (Gazans) killed.

The struggle continues—and the ratio of Palestinian deaths continues to be highly disproportionate. With no Israeli causalities, at least 60 Gazans have been shot and killed by Israeli soldiers in recent days.

The Future

It is hard to know what the future holds for the Palestinians. The move of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem just yesterday does not portend well for a peaceful solution to the Palestinian problem.

Yet, there are people of goodwill, including Palestinian Christians, working for a peaceful solution to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the West Bank. One such Christian leader is Naim Stifan Ateek, and I highly recommend his book A Palestinian Theology of Liberation (2017), of which I wrote a review you can read here.

Also, the CPT [Christian Peacemaker Teams] Palestine is a faith-based organization that supports Palestinian-led, nonviolent, grassroots resistance to the Israeli occupation and the unjust structures that uphold it. By collaborating with local Palestinian and Israeli peacemakers and educating people in their home communities, they seek to help create a space for justice and peace.

These are just two examples of people/organizations working in non-violent ways for peace and justice in Palestine/Israel. May their tribe increase!

The Relevance of Jonah

Strange as it may seem, I was moved to write this article while reading a book on Palestinian liberation theology. Please think with me about the ongoing relevance, even to Palestinian Christians, of the Old Testament book of Jonah.

Preaching on Jonah

From way back, I have long been interested in the theological and missiological meaning of Jonah. The sermon I preached in my seminary homiletics class was on Jonah. I can’t remember if the sermon on Jonah was the only one I preached before the class. But I do remember it—and wish I still had the manuscript for that sermon. (Why can’t I find it on my hard drive?)

At that time (1961), June and I were pursuing a career as overseas missionaries, and I was convinced that there was a strong missionary message in Jonah. That conviction has not changed, although it has been refined some.

Thus, it was with great interest that I read about Jonah in a new book on Palestinian liberation theology.

Ateek’s Emphasis on Jonah

Naim Stifan Ateek is a Palestinian Christian and an Arab who is a citizen of the nation of Israel. Ateek (b. 1937) is the retired Canon of St. George’s Cathedral in Jerusalem. His book A Palestinian Theology of Liberation was published earlier this year. 

Since I have written about the plight of the Palestinians previously (see especially here and here), this article is only about the main point that Ateek makes about Jonah in his book.

“The Theology of Jonah” is a brief section (pp. 76~80) in Ateek’s book. He asserts: “Through the story of Jonah, the Old Testament reaches its theological climax.”

Jonah is the apex of OT theology because there we find emphasis on God as the God of the whole world, an inclusive God. Secondly, Jonah teaches us that “God’s people include all people.”

Ateek’s main point is the third thing we need to learn from Jonah: “The story of Jonah emphasizes that there is no one particular land that belongs to God. God is the God of the whole world. . . . God is concerned about all lands.”

From the NIV Quickview Bible

Thus, “Authentic understanding of land rejects the exclusionary monopoly of one people that brings about the negation, expulsion, and ethnic cleansing of the people of the land” (such as the Palestinians).

Ateek goes on to stress, “The challenge of authentic faith is to overcome and defeat whatever is exclusionary regarding our theology of God, neighbor, and land, and to embrace whatever is inclusive.”

Bell’s “Take” on Jonah

Pastor Rob Bell made a splash in the theological world with his book Love Wins (2011)—about which I wrote in my blog article titled “Bell on Hell.”

Bell’s latest book is titled, What Is the Bible? How an Ancient Library of Poems, Letters, and Stories Can Transform the Way You Think and Feel About Everything (2017). “Fish,” the 13^th of his 43 short chapters, is about Jonah.

Bell cautions against Christians placing importance on “defend-the-fish” arguments in interpreting Jonah while missing “the point of the story, the point about allowing God’s redeeming love to flow through us with such power and grace that we are able to love and bless even our worst enemies” (p. 104).

Harking back to my most recent article (here), Jonah teaches the importance of loving those whom we have othered.

At this time when the U.S. Administration—and evangelical Christians who are some of its strongest supporters—tends to other (“illegal”) immigrants, Muslims, the poor, they—and we all—need to pay close attention to the relevance of the theology of Jonah. 

The Folly of Christmas

Yesterday was Christmas Day. Just like five years ago it was Sunday, an especially good day for family and friends to get together and to enjoy a festive time. But, oddly, Christmas on Sunday isn’t a particularly a good day for churches.

Most churches had scaled back activities yesterday, and some even had expanded Christmas Eve programs and no services on Sunday.

A foolish claim?

This article, though, is not about the folly of Christmas Day being on Sunday. It is about the folly of Christmas itself—and I am writing this partly as an extension of my previous blog article titled “In Praise of Folly.”

When you get right down to it, isn’t the Christian claim that God Almighty chose to send the Savior of the world as a baby born in humble circumstances in a sparsely settled place in the world a rather foolish one?

Walking where Jesus walked

In the summer of 2015, I went with my daughter Karen to Israel/Palestine. Our first time there, we greatly enjoyed traveling in a rental car from Tel Aviv to Nazareth—and then to Tiberius on the west bank of the Sea of Galilee, to Capernaum on the north bank of that beautiful sea, down the east side of that sea to the Dead Sea, and then on to the fascinating city of Jerusalem.

Our time in the “Holy Land” was certainly interesting and enjoyable. For me, though, it was not a time of great religious impact—in a positive sense at least.

People who lead, and especially tourist agencies who sell, tours to Israel encourage people to join in their “inspirational journey” in order to have a “life-changing” experience by “walking where Jesus walked” (words from a travel website).

That wasn’t exactly what I experienced.

I visited the Church of the Nativity, the large, ancient building over the place in Bethlehem where Jesus supposedly was born. We also visited Nazareth Village, a reconstruction of what Jesus’ boyhood neighborhood looked like—and quite near to where he probably lived.

At Capernaum we walked on the seashore where Jesus called his first disciples. We then drove up the big hill north of that small town to where Jesus delivered what is called the Sermon on the Mount. Later that week we saw where Jesus was crucified and visited the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, built on the site where Jesus was buried and then resurrected three days later.

The foolishness of God

It was particularly in Nazareth and Capernaum that questions began to rise in my mind. Why would God choose such a remote, provincial, unsophisticated place as Nazareth to be the Savior’s hometown and an insignificant, out-of-the-way town like Capernaum to be the place for him to begin his ministry?

An even greater question is this: Why would Christ become a human being at all? 

As Erasmus expressed it in The Praise of Folly, Christ “became a fool when taking upon him the nature of man” (Wilson trans.; Kindle loc. 1256). The reference there, of course, is to Philippians 2:6-8, the basis for what biblical scholars refer to as kenotic theology, which explains the eternal Christ emptying himself to become a human.

The Apostle Paul’s answer, though, which Erasmus also quotes, is this: “the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom” (1 Cor. 1:25).

Yes, it was through the folly of the first Christmas that the Savior came into the world. On this day after Christmas, we each one are challenged to grasp the great significance of the “foolishness” of Christ’s birth—and to live our lives accordingly. 

Do More Prayers Make a Difference—to God?

Jimmy Carter’s grandson spoke briefly at the Democratic National Convention on July 26. Among other things, he said that “thanks to the miracles of modern science and the power of prayer” his grandfather is now free of cancer.

As an admirer of Jimmy Carter, at least most of the time, I was saddened last year when I heard that he had cancer—and happy to hear fairly recently that he now claims to be cancer-free.

But was it the power of prayer that caused that happy change?

There were certainly a lot of people who prayed for President Carter after hearing about his cancer. In April of this year, a webpage of the American Baptist Home Mission Society was titled, “Calling for prayers of healing for former U.S. President Jimmy Carter.”

That is just one example of numerous calls for prayer for Carter, who has been much more popular as an ex-President than he was while in the Oval Office.

This raises some interesting questions about prayer, however. Would God not have taken Carter’s cancer away if fewer people had prayed? If so, how many fewer? Was there a tipping point? Why? Does God decide whether to heal any given individual based on the number of prayers received?

Four years ago on August 15 my blog article (see here) was about intercessory prayer, and I raised some of these same questions. Because the situation hasn’t changed in these four years, allow me to repeat two paragraphs from that article.

The theological question, you see, is this: why would the all-loving God change things or do things differently, or better, because of prayer—and even be more likely to do so if there were a lot of prayers or a lot of people praying.

Jesus spoke disparagingly about those who think that they will be heard because of their many words (Matthew 6:7). Didn’t he likely think the same thing about those who believe that God will give special consideration to the words of many people?

Or, is prayer just the sending of “good vibes” out into the world that, literally, change things if there are enough such vibes for a specific purpose? Possibly, I guess—but I seriously doubt it.

I have long contended that prayer primarily changes the one who prays, not the One prayed to. Prayer has often changed me—but has it ever changed God? Probably not. 

So, was there any benefit for so many people praying for President Carter? Probably so—but not because those prayers changed God.

If praying for Carter caused some people to think about the yeoman’s work he has done through the years with Habitat for Humanity and to recognize the ongoing need for providing more and better housing for poor people across the country, those prayers were beneficial.

If praying for Carter caused others to recall his book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (2006) and to become more concerned about the plight of the Palestinians, those prayers were beneficial.

If praying for Carter caused still other people to reflect upon the problem of racism in the country and that in Atlanta next month he will be the convener and one of the keynote speakers of the New Baptist Covenant meeting using the slogan “Baptists Working Together for Racial Justice and Reconciliation,” those prayers were beneficial.

But I can’t imagine God saying to the angels (or whomever) at some point earlier this year, You know, if enough people pray for Jimmy, I will just take the old guy’s cancer away.

The Plight of the Palestinians

As you know from my recent article, this month I made a week’s visit to the country of Israel. My daughter Karen, who is a professor at the University of Arizona, was going to an academic conference in Tel Aviv, and she invited me to go with her. We both had a wonderful time there.

On June 24 while Karen was attending her conference, I made a trip to Bethlehem. By taxi I observed the current conditions there. Then I visited the Church of the Nativity and walked up and down the streets in the center of that recently walled city.

Since the early 2000s, the Israeli government has been building an extensive network of walls to restrict the movement of Palestinians, essentially imprisoning them within their cities/towns.  

Those imposing walls are from 20 to more than 25 feet high. Some of the sections are covered with graffiti, as you see in the picture below. That was part of the wall my Palestinian taxi driver took me by.

Bethlehem is within what is known as the West Bank, which is Palestinian territory under Israeli control since 1967. Tourists are able to enter and leave the city without much hassle, but Palestinians (which make up almost the entire population of the city) are greatly restricted and cannot leave without permits, which are difficult for most people to get. 

Seeing the people of Bethlehem virtually imprisoned in their own city was my initial introduction to the plight of the Palestinians.

Whereas Tel Aviv is a modern city with upscale department stores and restaurants, teeming with affluent people enjoying eating and drinking at sidewalk cafes as well as swimming and engaging in other fun activities on the beach of the Mediterranean Sea, Bethlehem is much more like a “third world” city.

Almost all the people in Bethlehem are Muslims but my taxi driver said he is a Christian. Like most of the Palestinians who live there, though, he bemoaned the lack of freedom and the restriction of basic human rights.

The next day, I was able to join Karen’s group for an all-day study tour of Jerusalem—and by all-day I mean we left a little after 8:30 a.m. and didn’t get back to the hotel until well after 10 p.m. Although quite tiring, it was a superb time of seeing significant sites and of learning about the history and current situation of Jerusalem, the most fascinating city I have ever visited.

Part of the tour was conducted by an NGO Ir Amim guide, who showed us how Israel is steadily building “settlements” in East Jerusalem, territory originally designated for Palestinians.

According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, by 2013 there were nearly 360,000 Israelis living in such settlements. There are far more than that now. And by settlements, I am talking about fine residential communities built to last permanently.

While these Israeli settlements are illegal according to international law, Israeli citizens continue to move freely to and from those settlements. Palestinians, though, remain trapped by the “separation walls” that have been built on their own lands.

The human rights of Palestinians have been grossly trampled on since the formation of modern Israel in 1948 and then by the nation of Israel, especially since 1967. It is high time for peace and justice advocates to stand with the Palestinian people in opposition to their demeaning and unjust treatment.

Supporting the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) Movement for freedom, justice, and equality is one concrete action we might take. You can learn more about that Movement here.