Retreat to Bethlehem

A few weeks ago, Chris and I went with a group of 25 students associated with the Living Stones Center from Birzeit University to Bethlehem for an overnight retreat. The purpose was to bring these students together to hear lectures on self-awareness (with regards to personalities) and communication skills.

I am currently writing a paper in which I have researched some of the major issues facing Palestinian university students. As products of the First and Second Intifadas (uprisings) in 1987 and 2000, these students grew up under tremendous amounts of violence, trauma, and pressure. As part of the ministry of the Living Stones Center, it seeks through retreats such as this to provide seminars for personal development, to bring students together over common issues, and to create a semblance of an escape from the issues they face everyday as students under occupation.

This retreat also was an incredible way to get to know these students. I sat with them for hours discussing religion, listening to them play music, and also got to walk around Old Bethlehem with them. Overall, it was a very successful retreat and I feel very blessed to have had this opportunity to get to know these students better.

Selma, Laila, and me in front of the entrance to the Church of the Nativity

The inside of the church

Walking to the retreat center (also functions as a school for kids), called "Talitha Kumi" - what Jesus said in Aramaic to the little girl when He raised her from the dead - Mark 5:41.

Seminar

Having fun at night - at a restaurant in Bethlehem - Baha'a, Maj'd, Renad, Aboud, Tariq

Daily Life

Some of the kids from the Catholic school coming out of school for the day. We teach English/Phys Ed classes here 4 days a week.

Playing foozeball - a Living Stones Center staple for the university students who come by (clockwise from left: Samer, Hossan, Ahmed, and Tony)

At one of the schools that we teach - in Surda (a community outside of Ramallah)

Hanging out!

Cooking with Laila!

favorite pics from jerusalem

This picture is actually in Birzeit. The day we went to Jerusalem was November 11th - marking the 3 year anniversary of Yasir Arafat's death. Posters of him went up everywhere throughout town.

At the wall going into Israel, Chris got left behind... just kidding

In the Old City, Jerusalem

At the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (built at the site where Christ was crucified and buried)

Armenian Orthodox priests

We turned a corner and... whoa!!! There's Al-Aqsa Mosque! (built on the site where Abraham offered up Isaac)

At the Wailing Wall! (a dream come true)

Can you believe these t-shirts?!? Of course my eye caught the Philadelphia Eagles t-shirt

Jaffa St.

Jerusalem

On Sunday, Ahmed took Chris, Geir, Elias and me to Jerusalem because he could finally enter Israel. A few weeks ago the Israeli government denied him a permit – but now that he has one, we celebrated by visiting some sites.

Getting into Israel proved to be very interesting. After taking the taxi from Ramallah (where we witnessed a growing fanfare of memorandum for Yassir Arafat who died 3 years ago today), we had to get off at the Wall and walk through 2 security “points.” The first seemed rather pointless, and the second felt like airport security (with a conveyer belt that stopped working when our turn came through to use it).

We took the bus/taxi to the Garden Tomb area and then walked straight into the Old City. It was really weird – like entering into this almost underground territory – no cars – only narrow, old, stone streets – with shops on certain alleys, and people walking around. Oftentimes we ran into little boys’ soccer games.

We headed into a small lunch shop and ate hummus and ful (which has beans) with pita bread. A couple bends around some corners and we arrived at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, also called the Church of the Resurrection. There were tourist groups from everywhere. We didn’t really know where to start – but just walked around the inside circumference of the church and witnessed a unique procession of Armenian orthodox priests around the supposed “tomb.”

We tried to enter the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock next, but the soldiers seemed to have a problem with Ahmed’s permit, and it was soon closing anyway. The Wailing Wall definitely took my breath away. I went to the womens’ section, and an elderly woman seemed to motion for me to use her chair to pray. A little later I peeked through the wall and saw Chris, Geir, and Elias with the Kippot on.

The next “site” included Jaffa street, where, Ahmed told us, the Abbas government had planned attacks before on Israelis, “…but don’t worry!” Haha! We ate delicious ice cream (the kind famous in Israel – mixing all kinds of frozen fruit with yogurt)… and then eventually headed back to Ramallah, and then Birzeit.

Pictures from Elat

This article talks about the Sudanese refugee situation in Elat, and specifically about the Kibbutz we visited.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3413031,00.html

This link talks about the OPCY program that we went to Elat with

http://www.pbs-web.com/pbs_1024.htm

Journal Entries

10-31-07

As we climbed the hills into Jerusalem and into the West Bank, I had a sinking feeling of homesickness and yet found myself mustering up a firm resolve to continue onward in this task before me. I prayed. I honestly don’t look forward to teaching English. I don’t look forward to hearing more and more stories of the intifadas or of the many restrictions which complicate and frustrate the daily lives of Palestinians. Nor do I look forward to more conversations that I can’t partake in because I don’t know the language…
Moving through dusty, rumble-filled streets, we reached our apartment building and finally unpacked. It was nice in Elat to not have much of a schedule, to get a lot of sun, to see beautiful fish underwater, and most of all to visit the Sudanese refugee camp that the OPCY group performed in front of. But the week begins tomorrow as we sleep in, use the internet at the student center, and then perhaps teach English to seventh grade boys (and maybe some girls) at one of the surrounding villages. Three young guys from Norway recently joined Chris and I as volunteers out of the Living Stones, so we are looking forward to their fellowship and their assistance. Perhaps there will be even more laughter from the kids as they meet 3 fellows so different from themselves.
Tonight though, was great. Within the hour that we arrived back at the apartment, Ahmed called and said there was a concert in Ramallah centered around support for Palestine and its people. We packed two taxis with students from the Living Stones Center, walked through Ramallah center, and arrived at a cleared out, dusty parking lot where people gathered to listen to traditional Palestinian music and then some local rap artists. Unfortunately, I could not understand much of the lyrics of the rap songs, but with help from Mary, one of the students, and my limited Arabic, I could gather the song’s purpose, describing the plight of the Palestinians. 11/7/08
We read a book in Advocacy class that really changed my perspective on this – or more like answered some burning, unresolved questions in my mind. When the problems of the world are pressing down, when the issues seem too incredibly complex to unravel, when you don’t know where to begin to “witness,” it is enough to live faithfully to the Lord each day – and trust Him that as you boldly live your life for Christ, even a small change toward anything God-ward in a person you are trusting to impact for Christ is a victory. How comforting. This is not some wacked-out theology professor’s theory, but one that repeats itself quietly over and over again in Scripture. To trust God is to trust His timing and His work with the words you speak and the actions you demonstrate.
I’m hoping to grow deeper in my trust, wiser in my decisions, and more loving in my actions.

After Sana and Renad came over to cook food for us this afternoon, we went to hang out with Sana, Baha, and Ibrahim at a place where you can smoke hagila (hubbly-bubbly). But I just had some Nes-café. I really like Sana. She suggested we play a kind of truth-or-dare game in a get-to-know-you kind of format. We spun a coke bottle on a coffee table – whoever the spout of coke bottle pointed to, they were asked a question (or a dare) by the person seated at the other end of the coke bottle. Some of the greatest questions were, “What do you most like and dislike about yourself?” “Where would you most like to live?” and “What do you want to do most before you die?”
It’s not easy to live in a place of constant tension and uncertainty, but I guess this is the place God has chosen to conform me into His Son. I must rest in that. I love the people. I love the music. And I love that God has fulfilled yet another dream of mine in a way most unexpected and much more stupendous than I ever could have planned – to LIVE in the Holy Land, and not just Israel, but Palestine… What a Planner.

(Sana and Renad)







(Me and Renad)