With Fr. Mel's permission, here is a wonderful sermon he offered at the monastery on Sunday of the Samaritan Woman.
This sermon was preached at the Monastery near the day on which some Americans expected “the
Rapture” to occur.
In the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
A few short days ago some of us present here were in a town called Nablus, in the West Bank, in the Holy
Land. There we visited the Church of the Samaritan woman, whose feast it is today. In the Church we saw
the well, and we drank water from it.
It was good to be present in the place whose identity few could dispute. Over the years, the human race is
capable of moving all sorts of things, of losing all sorts of things, but no one can easily move a well. This
was the place where Christ met the woman of Samaria, and it is in Nablus.
Nablus is, and has been since the time of Christ, a place of sorrow and division. Then it was the division
between Jews and Samaritans, now a place of separation between Jews and Arabs. Actually, it is in heart
of Palestinian homeland, surrounded with all the tensions and sorrows caused by that particular conflict. It
is also a sad place, since it is the site of a recent Christian martyrdom when a former priest was murdered
there some years ago by a religious fanatic. However, scenes of martyrdom become, in God’s time, places
of hope and happiness, and we could already see the transformation taking place. Since the death of
Father Philoumenos in 1979, the church has prospered and under the guidance of its present pastor, the
Church is being transformed into a beautiful place of pilgrimage.
The story of the Samaritan woman is one of those stories where we actually get to see a fairly good look
at someone who comes to Jesus for healing. Sometimes the Gospel writers are so intent on showing us
Jesus that they fail to show as much about people that come to Him. In this case we have something of
the character image of the Samaritan woman. In the Gospel she is not named, but in Christian tradition,
and in quite early Christian tradition at that, she is given a name. In Greek it is Photini, based on the Latin
word "phos" which means light, in Russian/Slavonic countries it is Svetlana, based on the word "svet",
which means light. In Celtic countries the name is Fiona, based on the Celtic/Gaelic word "fionn" (light)
and in the world of languages derived from Latin, she is called either Clair or Lucia.
So we have a woman called “Light”. There are two occasions when the Church presents us with the
themes of “light” and “water” together. This is one of them. The other is the Theophany of Christ, on
Jan 6th, when we see the Baptism of Christ and the blessing of water, but which is called - throughout
the Greek world at least – Ta Phota, the Lights. In today’s story we have Jacob's well and its water, upon
which is transposed a strong theme of light. This is a paradox, which we need to enter into our hearts in
order, not to understand (there is nothing to understand), but to appreciate.
The historical details surrounding this story are not entirely necessary to see its significance. Once you
have gathered that Jews and Samaritans don't get along, that as a rule Jewish men don't talk to women
that they don't know, and that it is not possible for a Jew to observe the laws of ritual purity and to eat
anything in Samaria, let’s then look at the relationship between the woman and Christ himself.
It is an encounter, an unexpected encounter. The woman isn't on any great spiritual quest; she is simply
going to the well to get water, which she does quite regularly. But on this occasion she meets God. There
is an interchange between them in which Christ shows to the woman that He is not just some ordinary
bystander. The encounter happens. And, as her name implies, in this encounter she becomes radiant in the
Light of Christ, much as the three Disciples were bathed in the light of Christ at the Transfiguration on
Mount Tabor. In her case, not in any obvious visible way, but in a symbolic or figurative way.
And the first thing the Light does is to shine upon her and suddenly we see her in a rather bleak situation.
We don't know the reason why she has been married so many times, but the hint in the Gospel is that she
is not particularly faithful to anybody and that her acquaintance with truth is somewhat sporadic. We see
that she is a broken, broken woman, spiritually, socially, ethnically. And she doesn’t even seem to notice.
Each time we encounter Christ we can expect the same thing to happen. Since the Light of Christ shines
first of all upon our own brokenness, then we realize just how broken we are. And this can in turn lead
to depression and sadness, since every time we meet Christ the same thing seems to happen: we see
ourselves in the shadows of His light. It never seems to get better. Every time we see Christ, we are
reminded of the darkness that we have to live with.
But that isn't the end of the story. The Light of Christ isn't simply an object outside the Samaritan woman,
it's something which enters the life of that woman and has a dynamism, a power of its own. The Light of
Christ begins to heal the woman where she most needs it.
She then leaves Christ and goes back to her countrymen to tell them what has happened. Not in any subtle
or spiritual way, she is simply impressed by someone who tells her about her past without knowing it,
and she wants to share that with other people. But we know from the Church Tradition that it was the
place of St. Photini to bring the light of Christ to whomever she met. And this is the second part of this
"light" theme. We don't stop with the light shining on our darkness so that we can see how dark it is, we
continue then to allow the Light to penetrate us so that we indeed can become a living thing. Having
been touched by Christ (in case of the Samaritan woman literally, in our case in and through the Holy
Mysteries of the Church ) we are illumined. And then we carry the Light of Christ (we are not necessarily
at this point made worthy of anything) but we carry the Light of Christ wherever we happen to go. And
the Light of Christ has the potential to enlighten all those whom we meet, whether or not we realize it at
the time.
To be a Light-Bearer is perhaps the highest aspiration of the Christian soul. The process works best when
we are aware that whenever we go into a place, a school, a shop, in a monastery, in the guesthouse, to
our neighbours, to our friends, wherever it is that we are, we are carrying the Light of Christ whether we
know it or not. And sometimes we simply have to let the light of Christ do its work, and having carried it
to its destination, get out of the way.
As far as we know, the encounter between Christ and the Samaritan woman did not bring about any
resolution to any of the historical problems in that part of the world. Those problems are now different
problems, with little chance of resolution on the level where we most commonly look. However, the
world was a different place, since the Light of Christ now shone in this woman, and that Light was not to
be extinguished by mere political difficulties.
In this Divine Liturgy we are also going to encounter Christ; we also are going to be illumined as she
was, and this will bring to the world a spiritual, a deeply-grounded, sense of what it means to enter the
Kingdom. It is through Christ touching our lives that the “Rapture” will occur, not in empty calculations
or false prophesy.
Maran atha. Come, Lord Jesus.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Friday, May 27, 2011
Day 11: May 13 (Friday) A free day to revisit places in the Old Town of Jerusalem
On this last full day we get our final chance to go back to the Old Town of Jerusalem and see some of the sites for the second time, or try to see some new places. The bus takes us there in the morning after breakfast, but I think some people did not wait for that way to get there, and started their day on foot a lot earlier. It would be nice if they shared the description of their adventures here.....
Well, I decided to stick with Fr. Martin and Ryan, they seemed to have a good plan, well balanced between some shopping, sightseeing and sampling Israeli foods for the last time..... We wondered the narrow streets, stopping at gift stores, getting some souvenirs. At one point we ended up in an alley that seemed to be more for locals than tourists, no tourist is looking for this kind of stuff.....
Fr. Martin tried to buy some wool for making prayer ropes, but the thick type he needs would require ordering from a catalog, all they had there was lots of ugly acrylic.....
We bumped into "our" people from time to time, it was rather fun.
We ventured again into the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and the tried to walk around the perimeter of the wall surrounding the old town, but the cars ran us off the streets and we ended up back in the narrow streets, towards pizza place for lunch and a meeting to take the bus to the hotel.
Well, I decided to stick with Fr. Martin and Ryan, they seemed to have a good plan, well balanced between some shopping, sightseeing and sampling Israeli foods for the last time..... We wondered the narrow streets, stopping at gift stores, getting some souvenirs. At one point we ended up in an alley that seemed to be more for locals than tourists, no tourist is looking for this kind of stuff.....
Fr. Martin tried to buy some wool for making prayer ropes, but the thick type he needs would require ordering from a catalog, all they had there was lots of ugly acrylic.....
We bumped into "our" people from time to time, it was rather fun.
We ventured again into the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and the tried to walk around the perimeter of the wall surrounding the old town, but the cars ran us off the streets and we ended up back in the narrow streets, towards pizza place for lunch and a meeting to take the bus to the hotel.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Day 10, May 12th: Mt. Sinai and drive back to Jerusalem
Day 10 May 12 Mt. Sinai and drive back to Jerusalem
Ryan, Theodore and George start their day at 1am with a hike up Mt. Sinai to watch the sunrise at 5am. Then they hurry down the mountain and join us just 10 min into the Liturgy at the Church!
We arrive at the Monastery around 5:45am and walk up to the Monastery complex to join in the Divine Liturgy with the monks. I think Fr. Meletios and Fr. Martin attended the Matins service before that, since they spent the night at the monastery. The inside of the Church is the most amazing I have ever been to. The presence of God there is undeniable. We are all so happy when Ryan, Ted and George join us just minutes into the start of the Liturgy. Fr. Meletios tells us that we have the blessing of the Archbishop to receive communion, which we all do.
After the end of the Liturgy, we venerate the relics of St. Catherine, which Fr. Nillos brings out into the church, and each one of us received a ring of St. Catherine. We spend a few minutes with Fr. Nillos, who tells us the story of the Monastery and all the events that took place there. There are several places on the internet that give a great summary, I encourage you to read them. Just the story of St. Catherine is the most amazing, I think she is now one of my favorite Saints! We take pictures of the Burning Bush, the well by which Moses met 7 daughters and his wife Sephora.....
We then go into the Museum of icons. The icons of St. Catherine's monastery are some of the most famous in the world. The time in the icon museum is just not long enough, to look and appreciate what we are seeing. Steven did a great job of taking pictures of the various notes and also manuscripts, I feel like I missed most of the museum, concentrating on the icon of Christ Pantacrator and the icon of the Ladder of Divine Ascent (the book "Ladder of Divine Ascent" was written at St. Catherine's Monastery by St. John Climacus, where he was an abbot in (....)
We are then met by Fr. Justin, a monk from Texas, a historian and keeper of monastery's library. He actually takes us to the library room and shows us a few rare manuscripts that will be shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts during an exhibit next year, maybe....
And all along, as we move throught the monastery that morning, we experience rain!!! It only rains maybe 4 days a year and it rains while we are there!!!
We also quickly visit the ossuary, a place where monks' bones are kept, all of the monks who lived here since the 6th century. It the desert it is impossible to find places to bury everybody separately, so the graves are recycled and the bones stored in the ossuary, separated anatomically. The body of St. Stephanos is kept intact in a glass case.
We finish with a stop in the gift store and head down the road to the bus.
Drive to the hotel in Jerusalem is long, with a change of buses at the border (Jalal picks us up). Some way into our drive we run into traffic problems, caused by really bad accident. See Fr. Martin's Facebook entry, he found a link to an article about this accident. Very tragic, a whole family lost its life in a head on collision with a bus.
Oh, and Fr. Mel gets his acupuncture treatment, while riding the bus. All sorts of services included on this pilgrimage!
We stop a couple of times, once for lunch at the dairy kabutz, and again for coffee somewhere at a rest stop. We make it in time to the hotel for a quick dinner and then a meeting to look back a little at our trip and our experiences. I hope everybody agrees with me that this was the most amazing trip ever. Of course the places we visited were amazing and spectacular, but what I liked the most was all the people with whom I got to see these places. We were a totally random group that in the end felt like family, each and every single person. I miss each and every one of the very much. At one point Dan joked that I must take drugs early in the morning, because I have such a happy smile at breakfast. It made me realize that I am so happy seeing them all each morning, there is no other way to greet them but with a huge smile. So here is your answer Dan! :)
Oh, I guess I still need to write a few words about my Day 11, which we had as free day. If anybody else wants to send me a summary of their free day, I will add that to the post. It might be fun to do the last day that way.
Ryan, Theodore and George start their day at 1am with a hike up Mt. Sinai to watch the sunrise at 5am. Then they hurry down the mountain and join us just 10 min into the Liturgy at the Church!
We arrive at the Monastery around 5:45am and walk up to the Monastery complex to join in the Divine Liturgy with the monks. I think Fr. Meletios and Fr. Martin attended the Matins service before that, since they spent the night at the monastery. The inside of the Church is the most amazing I have ever been to. The presence of God there is undeniable. We are all so happy when Ryan, Ted and George join us just minutes into the start of the Liturgy. Fr. Meletios tells us that we have the blessing of the Archbishop to receive communion, which we all do.
After the end of the Liturgy, we venerate the relics of St. Catherine, which Fr. Nillos brings out into the church, and each one of us received a ring of St. Catherine. We spend a few minutes with Fr. Nillos, who tells us the story of the Monastery and all the events that took place there. There are several places on the internet that give a great summary, I encourage you to read them. Just the story of St. Catherine is the most amazing, I think she is now one of my favorite Saints! We take pictures of the Burning Bush, the well by which Moses met 7 daughters and his wife Sephora.....
We then go into the Museum of icons. The icons of St. Catherine's monastery are some of the most famous in the world. The time in the icon museum is just not long enough, to look and appreciate what we are seeing. Steven did a great job of taking pictures of the various notes and also manuscripts, I feel like I missed most of the museum, concentrating on the icon of Christ Pantacrator and the icon of the Ladder of Divine Ascent (the book "Ladder of Divine Ascent" was written at St. Catherine's Monastery by St. John Climacus, where he was an abbot in (....)
We are then met by Fr. Justin, a monk from Texas, a historian and keeper of monastery's library. He actually takes us to the library room and shows us a few rare manuscripts that will be shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts during an exhibit next year, maybe....
And all along, as we move throught the monastery that morning, we experience rain!!! It only rains maybe 4 days a year and it rains while we are there!!!
We also quickly visit the ossuary, a place where monks' bones are kept, all of the monks who lived here since the 6th century. It the desert it is impossible to find places to bury everybody separately, so the graves are recycled and the bones stored in the ossuary, separated anatomically. The body of St. Stephanos is kept intact in a glass case.
We finish with a stop in the gift store and head down the road to the bus.
Drive to the hotel in Jerusalem is long, with a change of buses at the border (Jalal picks us up). Some way into our drive we run into traffic problems, caused by really bad accident. See Fr. Martin's Facebook entry, he found a link to an article about this accident. Very tragic, a whole family lost its life in a head on collision with a bus.
Oh, and Fr. Mel gets his acupuncture treatment, while riding the bus. All sorts of services included on this pilgrimage!
We stop a couple of times, once for lunch at the dairy kabutz, and again for coffee somewhere at a rest stop. We make it in time to the hotel for a quick dinner and then a meeting to look back a little at our trip and our experiences. I hope everybody agrees with me that this was the most amazing trip ever. Of course the places we visited were amazing and spectacular, but what I liked the most was all the people with whom I got to see these places. We were a totally random group that in the end felt like family, each and every single person. I miss each and every one of the very much. At one point Dan joked that I must take drugs early in the morning, because I have such a happy smile at breakfast. It made me realize that I am so happy seeing them all each morning, there is no other way to greet them but with a huge smile. So here is your answer Dan! :)
Oh, I guess I still need to write a few words about my Day 11, which we had as free day. If anybody else wants to send me a summary of their free day, I will add that to the post. It might be fun to do the last day that way.
Day 9: Wednesday May 11 Drive to Mt. Sinai
Day 9, Wednesday May 11 Drive to Mt. Sinai
We left really early for our drive to Egypt. The big suitcases stayed at the hotel and we just brought day bags for one night at the hotel in the town of St. Catherine. Joseph drove with us to the border. As always,
on the way there he told us detalis about the past and the present. As we drove past the Dead Sea, he said that the only way to traverse the desert was using a camel. You could not do it on foot, not even on a horse.
This is why the camel is called the "ship of the desert".
He pointed out accacia trees. The Arc of the Covenanat was made from accacia wood. The presence of accacia tree in the desert indicates that there is water in that area, this is where one is likely to be successful in digging a well.
We look for ibex goats on the slops of the mountains we pass.
First short stop was to dip our toes in the Dead Sea. We stopped at a resort complex and walked to the beach. Joseph warned us that if we stayed too long, your toes would get picked and shrivel away :). The water is very salty, it tastes almost acidic and stings if you have a cut or a mosquito bite. We took some pictures and off we went.
We drove by Mt. Sodom and a statue of Lot's wife, who turned into the stone after looking back.
Dead Sea Works is a factory on the shore of Dead Sea where they extract lots of minerals. Dead Sea is one of the biggest deposits of many minerals. We leave Dead Sea behind and keep driving through the desert.....
Lunch stop is at Yotvata Kabutz. THis place is famous for its dairy products and especially ice cream.
As we keep driving, Joseph said that we went by the Timna National Park, with King Solomon mine, where copper for the Pharaohs came from, and also malakayt (sp?) stone.
THen we reach the Red Sea and the city of Eliat, a resort with many attractions such as Imax theartre, underwater observatory, shopping malls. This resort city receives very little rain and has no water source near by, so all its water comes from desalination. The Red Sea has beautiful coral reefs, warm water and sharks! On the other side of Eliat is Jordan's city Aquaba, which is I think their only sea access.
As we get closer to the border with Egypt, we say goodbye to Joseph. Fr. Meletios offers him a beautiful cross as a gift, one he will be able to use when he becomes priest! Joseph tells us that each one of
us is now a "hadji", a pilgrim blessed throught his/her visit to the Holy Land. And it is up to us to pass that blessing to people in our lives who have not been here yet....
We go throught the border crossing with Egypt, mostly without too much excitement, but its a different experience. We walk with our luggage, through Israeli security to Egyptian land boarder crossing of Taba.
On the other side there is a new bus and drive Mohamed, a new guide Osama, his assistant, a police security preson in plain clothes. I think we have a car escort for a little while too. Our guide is very eager to tell us all he can.
Our drive is 1/2 hour from Taba to Nueba and then 2.5 hours from Nueba to the monastery.
We stop to look at some ancient pictures on the granit rocks in the desert. That's were some Bedouin women came to sell us some souvenirs...
He tells the story of St. Catherine's monastery fairly well. The first Chapel was built in the year 330 by St. Helena on the spot of the Burning Bush. The mountains of this area are granite, In the 6th century the walls were built first, and then the Basilica. The Church is dedicated to Transfiguration. The actual Burning Bush has been carbon dated to be 3500 years old. `
THe story of St. Catherine is the most beautiful, even as Osama tells it.
We arrive at the city of St. Catherine, and after a short bus tour of the Bedouin city, we arrive at our hotel. Fr. Meletios and Fr. Martin continue on to spend the night at the monastery. Food here is not as great as in Israel, and we were told by Joseph not to eat anything uncooked. After dinner we went shopping for souvenirs in the boutiques of the hotel, and there was a ton of them!
We left really early for our drive to Egypt. The big suitcases stayed at the hotel and we just brought day bags for one night at the hotel in the town of St. Catherine. Joseph drove with us to the border. As always,
on the way there he told us detalis about the past and the present. As we drove past the Dead Sea, he said that the only way to traverse the desert was using a camel. You could not do it on foot, not even on a horse.
This is why the camel is called the "ship of the desert".
He pointed out accacia trees. The Arc of the Covenanat was made from accacia wood. The presence of accacia tree in the desert indicates that there is water in that area, this is where one is likely to be successful in digging a well.
We look for ibex goats on the slops of the mountains we pass.
First short stop was to dip our toes in the Dead Sea. We stopped at a resort complex and walked to the beach. Joseph warned us that if we stayed too long, your toes would get picked and shrivel away :). The water is very salty, it tastes almost acidic and stings if you have a cut or a mosquito bite. We took some pictures and off we went.
We drove by Mt. Sodom and a statue of Lot's wife, who turned into the stone after looking back.
Dead Sea Works is a factory on the shore of Dead Sea where they extract lots of minerals. Dead Sea is one of the biggest deposits of many minerals. We leave Dead Sea behind and keep driving through the desert.....
Lunch stop is at Yotvata Kabutz. THis place is famous for its dairy products and especially ice cream.
As we keep driving, Joseph said that we went by the Timna National Park, with King Solomon mine, where copper for the Pharaohs came from, and also malakayt (sp?) stone.
THen we reach the Red Sea and the city of Eliat, a resort with many attractions such as Imax theartre, underwater observatory, shopping malls. This resort city receives very little rain and has no water source near by, so all its water comes from desalination. The Red Sea has beautiful coral reefs, warm water and sharks! On the other side of Eliat is Jordan's city Aquaba, which is I think their only sea access.
As we get closer to the border with Egypt, we say goodbye to Joseph. Fr. Meletios offers him a beautiful cross as a gift, one he will be able to use when he becomes priest! Joseph tells us that each one of
us is now a "hadji", a pilgrim blessed throught his/her visit to the Holy Land. And it is up to us to pass that blessing to people in our lives who have not been here yet....
We go throught the border crossing with Egypt, mostly without too much excitement, but its a different experience. We walk with our luggage, through Israeli security to Egyptian land boarder crossing of Taba.
On the other side there is a new bus and drive Mohamed, a new guide Osama, his assistant, a police security preson in plain clothes. I think we have a car escort for a little while too. Our guide is very eager to tell us all he can.
Our drive is 1/2 hour from Taba to Nueba and then 2.5 hours from Nueba to the monastery.
We stop to look at some ancient pictures on the granit rocks in the desert. That's were some Bedouin women came to sell us some souvenirs...
He tells the story of St. Catherine's monastery fairly well. The first Chapel was built in the year 330 by St. Helena on the spot of the Burning Bush. The mountains of this area are granite, In the 6th century the walls were built first, and then the Basilica. The Church is dedicated to Transfiguration. The actual Burning Bush has been carbon dated to be 3500 years old. `
THe story of St. Catherine is the most beautiful, even as Osama tells it.
We arrive at the city of St. Catherine, and after a short bus tour of the Bedouin city, we arrive at our hotel. Fr. Meletios and Fr. Martin continue on to spend the night at the monastery. Food here is not as great as in Israel, and we were told by Joseph not to eat anything uncooked. After dinner we went shopping for souvenirs in the boutiques of the hotel, and there was a ton of them!
Day 8 (Tuesday): Jerusalem: Way of the Cross, Church of the Resurection, visit with Patriarch, St. Simeon's church, Ascension, Gethsemeny
Day 8, May 10th Tuesday
We start our day with a visit to Old Jerusalem. We entered through the Lion's Gate, originally known as St. Steven's gate. St. Steven was thrown from this gate and stoned to death, he is known as the first martyr (protomartyr). His stoning was witnessed by St. Paul.
There are seven gates into Jerusalem:
Damascus (under restoration)
Harod
Dung
......
First we walked to St. Anne church, a place where Joachim and Anna lived, and the Virgin Mary was born. One of the Christ's miracles in Jerusalem (70% of all miracles were performed near in the Sea of Galilee) was healing of the man paralyzed for 38 years near the pools of Bethesda. The pools are located very near St. Anna's Church. Jesus might have actually seen that man as a boy when he came with his mother to visit the house where his mother grew up. The healing pool, about the sirring of the water to heal, was a pagan belief.
Next we walked Way of the Cross, probably most well known to most other Christians who come to Jerusalem. The way of the Cross is a Catholic arrangement but it is very close to the route which Christ would have taken.
There are "stations" marked on the buildings:
I "Ecce Homo" church od the Sisters of Zion order.
II Christ's Prison Church - Jesus was brought to the Romans since the Jews did not have the authority to impose the death punishment. This is why they had to bring him to Pontius Pilate.
III Place where Jesus fell under the Cross
IV Place where Jesus met His Mother
VI Place where Veronica wiped his face
Last five stations are in the Church of the Sepulchar. It is amazing how all these little churches/chapels are connected, right next to one another, built to commemorate different parts of the route that Christ took on the way to His Cross.
A group photo is taken just before we enter the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Church of the Ressurection). Don't we all look happy? That's because we are!
We arrive at the Tomb of Christ and Joseph quickly gets us into the line which is not as long that morning as it could be. The Tomb has two chambers, first is where the stone was rolled away (there is a piece of stone there in a glass case) and the actual place where Christ's Body lay. We stood in line for a few minutes, getting ready to enter. Joseph told us about how to enter and what to look for, like the fact that the only original thing in the main chamber is the bedrock behind the icon (you have to open the icon to touch the bedrock, which we did!). I have to say that being there was a very moving experience, even if at the moment you are there there is so much to see and feel that it's almost impossible to be present as one should be. It would be difficult to realize the enormity of this experience if one were there totally alone and in perfect silence, but being there surrounded by the tourists, pushing and shoving makes being present almost impossible. But the way I like to think about being in all these places, whether I felt present or not, is remember Fr. Mel's words from one of his talks: that being in the presence of God changes us, imperceptibly to us and others, but nevertheless very much for real, even on the molecular level. I sure hope this kind of change happened to/in me on this wonderful trip!!!
Well, then we went around the Church some more, looking at different architectural features of the church, which include early byzantine, late byzantine and the crusaders'.
The historical facts about the places and events related to this church were reported as early as year 90 (St. John the Theologian would still have been alive) by a pagan historians. They wrote about "the Nazarenes" (followers of a certain Nazarene). He said the Nazarines go to venerate at certain places and they claim their leader has resurrected.
Roman's built pagan temples over these places to suppress Jewish and Christian traces.
Next we visited Adam's Chapel, which commemorates the place where Adam was buried and freed the moment Christ died and stepped down to Hades. The rock split beneath the Cross. All ancient Saints resurrected at that moment, since Christ broke the gates of hell and freed them. Crusaders buried their kings under the Calvary:
Next we entered the room full of relics (museum of the Patriarchate):
St. Andrew of Crete
John Chrysostome
St. Martinien
St. Panteleimon
St. Macrine (la main gauche)
St. John the Baptist
St. Mercure
Apostles Andrew, Philippe
Constantine
St. Basil
St. Mary Magdalene (hand)
st. Paraskieva
st. Charalampy
St. Steven
(and that is only the few I had time to write down)
Then we went for a audience at with the Patriarch of Jerusalem. He gave a really nice speech about the meaning of the presence of the Patriarchate in the Holy Land. The Revelation of God started in the Holy Land on Mt. Sinai (with Moses seeing a God in the burning bush and receiving the Commandments) and it culminated in Jerusalem with the Resurrection of our Lord. So Patriarchate's presence in the Holy Places is of spiritual importance but also a guaranty of physical presence of Christianity in the Middle East.
Lunch: part of the group sat down at a nice Italian restaurante, while others found a pizza-by-the-slice next door.
Next, St. John's monastery (of St. John the Baptist)
Then we drive through Jerusalem, by the University, main bank, Kneset, Museum where Dead Sea Scrolls are kept (most of us are so tired, it is getting hard to keep track of where we are, what we are seeing, even my own notes fro these last places for the day are now making no sense.....)
Monastery of the Cross, looks like the Monastery of St. Catherine (I cannot remember if we even went inside). Yes we did. It is an Armenian Orthodox Church, with very old frescoes and ancient Armenian writings.
I do remember though going into the Monastery of St. Simeon. He was one of the three scholars who translated the Bible. We were told his wonderful story, I will add this story here later, since it is long. He is the one who was only able to die after holding Baby Jesus at the age of 270 (some say 300). His body was stolen many times, and currently I think is still in Zata, Croatia.
Church of Ascension is on the Mount of Olives. It was saved from destruction many times and in miraculous ways, most recently in 1992 . We visit the rock with Christ's footprint. Fr. Achillos is abbot of that monastery.
We drive by the church "Pater Noster", where Christ taught his disciples how to pray.
Church of All Nations in the Garden of Gethsemane. We visit the garden, with beautiful old olive trees. Eight of the trees in the garden are at least 2000 years old. Inside the church is the Rock of Agony. We sit by it for a few moments.
Final stop that day was the Tomb of the Virgin Mary. It was saved becasue it was a mosque for a time. I think this is where we sat for a few moments in silence.
We start our day with a visit to Old Jerusalem. We entered through the Lion's Gate, originally known as St. Steven's gate. St. Steven was thrown from this gate and stoned to death, he is known as the first martyr (protomartyr). His stoning was witnessed by St. Paul.
There are seven gates into Jerusalem:
Damascus (under restoration)
Harod
Dung
......
First we walked to St. Anne church, a place where Joachim and Anna lived, and the Virgin Mary was born. One of the Christ's miracles in Jerusalem (70% of all miracles were performed near in the Sea of Galilee) was healing of the man paralyzed for 38 years near the pools of Bethesda. The pools are located very near St. Anna's Church. Jesus might have actually seen that man as a boy when he came with his mother to visit the house where his mother grew up. The healing pool, about the sirring of the water to heal, was a pagan belief.
Next we walked Way of the Cross, probably most well known to most other Christians who come to Jerusalem. The way of the Cross is a Catholic arrangement but it is very close to the route which Christ would have taken.
There are "stations" marked on the buildings:
I "Ecce Homo" church od the Sisters of Zion order.
II Christ's Prison Church - Jesus was brought to the Romans since the Jews did not have the authority to impose the death punishment. This is why they had to bring him to Pontius Pilate.
III Place where Jesus fell under the Cross
IV Place where Jesus met His Mother
VI Place where Veronica wiped his face
Last five stations are in the Church of the Sepulchar. It is amazing how all these little churches/chapels are connected, right next to one another, built to commemorate different parts of the route that Christ took on the way to His Cross.
A group photo is taken just before we enter the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Church of the Ressurection). Don't we all look happy? That's because we are!
We arrive at the Tomb of Christ and Joseph quickly gets us into the line which is not as long that morning as it could be. The Tomb has two chambers, first is where the stone was rolled away (there is a piece of stone there in a glass case) and the actual place where Christ's Body lay. We stood in line for a few minutes, getting ready to enter. Joseph told us about how to enter and what to look for, like the fact that the only original thing in the main chamber is the bedrock behind the icon (you have to open the icon to touch the bedrock, which we did!). I have to say that being there was a very moving experience, even if at the moment you are there there is so much to see and feel that it's almost impossible to be present as one should be. It would be difficult to realize the enormity of this experience if one were there totally alone and in perfect silence, but being there surrounded by the tourists, pushing and shoving makes being present almost impossible. But the way I like to think about being in all these places, whether I felt present or not, is remember Fr. Mel's words from one of his talks: that being in the presence of God changes us, imperceptibly to us and others, but nevertheless very much for real, even on the molecular level. I sure hope this kind of change happened to/in me on this wonderful trip!!!
Well, then we went around the Church some more, looking at different architectural features of the church, which include early byzantine, late byzantine and the crusaders'.
The historical facts about the places and events related to this church were reported as early as year 90 (St. John the Theologian would still have been alive) by a pagan historians. They wrote about "the Nazarenes" (followers of a certain Nazarene). He said the Nazarines go to venerate at certain places and they claim their leader has resurrected.
Roman's built pagan temples over these places to suppress Jewish and Christian traces.
Next we visited Adam's Chapel, which commemorates the place where Adam was buried and freed the moment Christ died and stepped down to Hades. The rock split beneath the Cross. All ancient Saints resurrected at that moment, since Christ broke the gates of hell and freed them. Crusaders buried their kings under the Calvary:
Next we entered the room full of relics (museum of the Patriarchate):
St. Andrew of Crete
John Chrysostome
St. Martinien
St. Panteleimon
St. Macrine (la main gauche)
St. John the Baptist
St. Mercure
Apostles Andrew, Philippe
Constantine
St. Basil
St. Mary Magdalene (hand)
st. Paraskieva
st. Charalampy
St. Steven
(and that is only the few I had time to write down)
Then we went for a audience at with the Patriarch of Jerusalem. He gave a really nice speech about the meaning of the presence of the Patriarchate in the Holy Land. The Revelation of God started in the Holy Land on Mt. Sinai (with Moses seeing a God in the burning bush and receiving the Commandments) and it culminated in Jerusalem with the Resurrection of our Lord. So Patriarchate's presence in the Holy Places is of spiritual importance but also a guaranty of physical presence of Christianity in the Middle East.
Lunch: part of the group sat down at a nice Italian restaurante, while others found a pizza-by-the-slice next door.
Next, St. John's monastery (of St. John the Baptist)
Then we drive through Jerusalem, by the University, main bank, Kneset, Museum where Dead Sea Scrolls are kept (most of us are so tired, it is getting hard to keep track of where we are, what we are seeing, even my own notes fro these last places for the day are now making no sense.....)
Monastery of the Cross, looks like the Monastery of St. Catherine (I cannot remember if we even went inside). Yes we did. It is an Armenian Orthodox Church, with very old frescoes and ancient Armenian writings.
I do remember though going into the Monastery of St. Simeon. He was one of the three scholars who translated the Bible. We were told his wonderful story, I will add this story here later, since it is long. He is the one who was only able to die after holding Baby Jesus at the age of 270 (some say 300). His body was stolen many times, and currently I think is still in Zata, Croatia.
Church of Ascension is on the Mount of Olives. It was saved from destruction many times and in miraculous ways, most recently in 1992 . We visit the rock with Christ's footprint. Fr. Achillos is abbot of that monastery.
We drive by the church "Pater Noster", where Christ taught his disciples how to pray.
Church of All Nations in the Garden of Gethsemane. We visit the garden, with beautiful old olive trees. Eight of the trees in the garden are at least 2000 years old. Inside the church is the Rock of Agony. We sit by it for a few moments.
Final stop that day was the Tomb of the Virgin Mary. It was saved becasue it was a mosque for a time. I think this is where we sat for a few moments in silence.
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