Pilgrimage Day Seven

Pilgrimage Day Seven – February 5, 2009 Healing – Death – Settlements

Pools of Bethseda
We begun the day at the at the site of the Pools of Bethseda. There is a very deep hole in the ground where there is a medieval basilica that has been excavated. Nest to it is a more modern church that has the most incredible acoustics in the world. When we arrived out Nigerian friends were there. We went into the church as they were about to leave when one of the women started to sing Amazing Grace. We, of course, joined in.
Then we proceed to pray and sing our own song, Guide me o thou great Redeemer. Maybe we should have been a choir.

Stations of the Cross
We begun our walk of the Via Dolorosa with a mass in the chapel at the Ecce Homo Convent near the Lion’s Gate. This is near Antonio’s Fortress where Pilate is said to have pronounced sentence on Jesus. Ecce homo means this man in Latin. Pilate said, “This man has committed no crime crucify him yourselves.” Fr. Dom preached and he expertly wove the song of homeless man chanting about the love of God and how it had never failed with the Gospel (John 3:11-16) and George Herbert’s poem, The Agony into a beautiful and inspiring homily.
We then proceeded to walk the Vas Dolorosa. We ended up at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The church was pretty crowded – especially because there was construction around the place where it is believed Jesus’ cross was placed in the rock of Calvary. We all got to venerate this place and then we sat and prayed about what we came to leave at the foot of the cross. Fr. Dom prayed with me for my intention. We then prayed the 13th and 14th stations near the spot where Jesus was laid when he was taken down from the cross.
Before we left we had a group picture taken on the steps of the church.

Lunch was at a local restaurant. We dined on Falafel and Mediterranean chicken (shwerma (sp?)).

In the afternoon we listened to a lecture by Jimmy Johnson of Israeli Citizens Against Housing Demolition (ICHAD). He talked about the structural discrimination against Palestinians and particularly housing demolitions. We visited the Town of Selwan in the Palestinian section of East Jerusalem and a Israeli economic settlement. The contrast between the two was striking. There were many facts and figures given out much too many to repeat in this space. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.










In the evening we heard a presentation from a woman who works for Rev. Niam Atiq’s organization, The Sabeel Institute. The institute works for peace and justice for Palestinians with the overall goal to achieve a lasting peace between Palestinians and Israelis. The US website is www.fosna.org. The Jerusalem website is www.sabeel.org.