Christians hold clashing views about the land they call holy
HUNDREDS of millions of followers of Jesus Christ are about to celebrate the annual feast of Pentecost, which celebrates an event in Jerusalem roughly 2,000 years ago, when it is believed that cultural and ethnic barriers were miraculously overcome. The festival, which falls on May 20th in this year’s western Christian calendar and a week later in the Orthodox one, commemorates what many regard as the establishment of the Christian church. A new kind of divine inspiration, including the ability to communicate with speakers of any language, is said to have come over the disciples who had gathered in the holy city for the Jewish festival of Shavuot, which falls seven weeks after Passover.
So there is sad irony in the fact that people who cherish that sacred story seem more divided than ever, with some rejoicing in Jerusalem’s rising earthly status and others expressing the very opposite view.
The divisions are especially pronounced among Christians who live in, or feel strongly attached to, the land they call sacred. Roman Catholics have been invited by the administrator of the Latin Patriarchate, the area’s highest Catholic authority, to mark the eve of Pentecost with a “prayer vigil for peace” in a well-known Jerusalem church. Clearly referring to the killing of around 60 Palestinians during recent protests at the Gaza-Israel border, the Italian organiser of the vigil, Father Pierbattista Pizzaballa, said: “We must condemn all forms of violence, any cynical use of human lives and disproportionate violence. Once again we are forced by circumstances to plead and cry out for justice and peace.” His statement contained obvious hints of rebuke to both Hamas, the organiser of the protests, and the Israeli authorities. The Patriarch’s website also published an appeal from an association of Catholic clerics and monastics in the region that put things more bluntly. Having expressed “great concern” over the 60 deaths and the injuries suffered by several thousand, it said:
These casualties, or most of them, could have been avoided if non-lethal tools had been used by the Israeli forces. We call [upon] all parties involved to avoid the use of violence and to find ways to end the siege imposed on about 2m Palestinians in Gaza...as soon as possible. In the meantime, we witnessed on the same day the relocation of the American embassy....Any [such] unilateral move or decision about the Holy City of Jerusalem doesn’t contribute to advancing the long-awaited peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
All these views are a world away from the staunchly pro-Israel sentiments of many evangelical Christians, two of whose most rambunctious leaders offered prayers at the ceremony marking the new American embassy. One was Pastor John Hagee, founder and chairman of a powerful group called Christians United for Israel, and the other was Robert Jeffress, pastor of a Dallas megachurch, who is notorious for his blunt predictions that followers of such creeds as Mormonism, Islam, Judaism and Hinduism are likely to end up in hell. Mr Hagee insisted afterwards that moving the American embassy would bring peace closer, by forcing the Palestinians to accept Jerusalem as the Jewish state’s capital. He said the violence in Gaza occurred simply because “Palestinians led by terrorists sought to breach Israel's borders and harm Israeli citizens, yet another example of Hamas and the Palestinian Authority finding an excuse to incite their people to violence.”
Of the two, Mr Jeffress is the more contentious because of his track record of harsh words on the likely fate of people who espouse other faiths, or forms of Christianity different from his own. The State Department insisted that the pastor’s appearance reflected a personal choice by David Friedman, the American ambassador, and the Department as a whole would “certainly not agree” with the preacher’s “controversial remarks about various religious groups”.
Whatever their feelings about metaphysical matters, Mr Hagee and Mr Jeffress are both unshakeable in their support for America’s new policy towards Israel. Still, asked by Fox News about his less-than-ecumenical views, Mr Jeffress said some previous statements of his had been ripped from context but he nonetheless stood by his position that:
Historical Christianity, for 2,000 years, has taught that salvation is faith in Christ alone, and the fact that I, and millions of evangelical Christians, still believe that is not bigoted and not newsworthy.
Mr Friedman, meanwhile, defended his choice of the two pastors because “they represented a community very much in support of” the shift of the American embassy, one that “shares the same belief that Jewish people have, that Israel is a special place, that its existence is evidence of a covenant between God and the Jewish people.” And, it might be added, all the above-named parties are very much in support of America’s 45th president.