Entering into Lent

As one enters the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem one's gaze is first drawn upward to the central dome and then to a stone slab on the floor and this mosaic (to the right) on the wall. It is the dramatic reminder of the central events of the crucifixion, and then the resurrection of Jesus, the Christ. Islam has its focus upon the holy book, the Qur'an, conveyed to the Prophet Mohammad from God, while Christianity has its central focus upon a person.
Many, many, many years ago when I was doing my undergraduate work at Pomona College in Claremont, California, this book was part of the reading list for a religion course. "What Contemporary Theologians are Thinking." Some 'smart' collegian had changed the punctuation so that it read: "What! Contemporary Theologians are Thinking?"

We are beginning the spring term at the seminary and I am teaching a reading class on Middle Easter Christianity after the Rise of Islam. One of the book I am having the students read is a part of the new series called: "A People's History of Christianity"which focuses beyond the saints, bishops, and theologians of traditional history. There are plenty of these figures for us to study, (the religious controvesies, the polemics against one's enemies, etc.), but I believe that it is important to consider "what the common people were thinking about religion".

What is it that we "common people" think about in this season of Lent, and how does it relate to our Christian faith and life? The first three chapters of the People's History series on "Byzantine Christianity" suggest some themes.

The first is entitled: "Lay Piety in the Sermons of John Chrysostom" and focuses on the ways that the Christian message calls us all to consider how our lives are to be lived in response to God's will, and what amendment and transformation is called for. Not a bad Lenten exercise, whether it comes from the stirring of one's conscience or the preaching of God's Word. The second is entitled: "The Cult of the Martyrs and the Cappadocian Fathers" and discusses the ways in which the Church sought to regularize and shape the local piety of the faithful. People turned to the local shrines and the popular saints hoping to obtain all sorts of benefits from a gracious God, anything from the repair of hernia to the successful conclusion to a business venture. To believe that in God's love, one will receive "good things" was central and acted out in those pilgrimages and visits to "holy" places. (How is it with us?) The third chapter, entitled: "Romanos and the Night Vigil in the Sixth Century, begins with this marvellous quote by Arundhati Roy:
"The secret of the Great Stories is that they have no secrets. The Great Stories are the ones you have heard and want to hear again. The ones you can enter anywhere and inhabit comfortably....They are as familiar as the house you live in. Or the smell of your lover's skin. You know how they end, yet you listen as though you don't." (p. 59)
These third themes:
A time to examine our lives in relations to God's Word
A moment to anticipate the "goodness" of God in our lives - and
An opportunity again to hear and to become part of the "Greatest
Story"
can, I pray, help us on our Lenten journey. Peace, Roger

More of Christmas Past and Mary

January 24, 2008

Greetings as we are quickly nearing the end of the Epiphany season. Barely time for one more reflection about Christmas and my visit to Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Preparing for Christmas in Muslim society like Egypt does not allow for any of the public display of decorations or the broadcasting of Christmas "songs" that we find in the West. A few store windows in the Coptic Christian section of Cairo showed some gifts for the Yule season and I saw one flower shops that sold trees. But Christmas here is celebrated solely in the churches and in Christian homes, not in the whole society. Maybe, not such a bad idea to help strip away all the "other stuff" and focus on the true meaning where and when Christians gather.

Bethlehem as you might expect was different. The icon at the top is from the Church of the Nativity, a sacred site for many Christian traditions. I also worshipped with the Lutherans at the Christmas Church nearby where we were treated to a concert of fine Christmas music from two choirs visiting from the Chicago area.

(the picture just above) A very special celebration with a rich array of the music for the birth of the Christ child.

We have just finished the course entitled: Women in the Muslim (the Qur'an and the traditions of the Prophet) and in the Christian Scriptures. It was taught by a visiting professor from Norway. The virgin Mary is an honored woman in each. Some passages in the Qur'an and Luke are quite similar, particularly in the annunication story. The angel Gabriel comes to Mary with the announcement which she finds hard to believe. Then, in the Qur'an, Mary is instructed to prostrate herself before the majesty of God, a sign that as a woman, she has the same ability from creation to respond to the Almighty as does a man. And also, this request, or it seemed to me to be more like a demand by the angel, sets a model for all women of obedience. What Luke goes on to tell in the continuing dialogue between God's messenger and God's handmaiden is a wonderfully warm encounter, which culminates in the song of praise and adoration we call the "Magnificat". I am glad we have Luke as one of our four Gospel accounts.

I have just been reading the term paper by a first year Sudanese student named Musa (Moises) Kody. He too compares the passages in these scriptures concerning Mary, and adds this reflection at the end,

"As we know, it had been the practice of each group (Christians and Muslims) blindly to defend "their" book as the only true one and to portray the other to be false and corrupted. This paper does not follow that tendency, but seeks to be an open and faithful research for those with devoted hearts who believe not only in the Scriptures, but in the God of the Scriptures, who is the one true God who can convert people who seek only the truth and follow it."

Food for thought.

I would add only this, as we are hearing daily of the effects of the Israeli blockage of the Palestinian territory of Gaza, the suffering this is bringing to the people living there - that Mary's song still applies today - that God is a God "who fills the hungry with good things. Pray for and work for a just and lasting peace for this area of God's world and for all of God's people. Roger

The Walls of Jerusalem

"We are standing within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together." My visit to the Holy Land over the new year was fascinating. There is much to see, much to learn. And one can walk around her walls in little over an hour.

The picture above is of two of the most important places, the "Dome of the Rock" for Muslims because it recalls the place where the prophet Mohammad was carried to and from heaven in a vision, and for Jews because the wall beneath this plateau is the one remaining part of the original temple complex build by Solomon and restored by Herod. The blue and white flag of the state of Israel announces to all that Israel controls the city now and has for forty years, but allows access by Muslims and Christians to their holy places.

I also visit Bethlehem for a concert by two choirs from Illinois who sang carrols at the Lutheran "Christmas" Church there. The Rev. Julie Rowe was my guide and as we road the bus from the Israeli controlled territory to the west bank area controlled by the Palestinians we were confrounted with a tall concrete wall. On it someone has written: "Ich bin ein Berliner", recalling another wall that divided peoples. Julie had many stories about the building of a wall between territory that Israel seeks to incorporate, land which Palestinian Arabs and Christians own and wish to continue farming. The Israeli argument is that this is for their security. However, by preventing the movement of Arab Palestinians to their means of livelihood and moving settlers on to this land, the effect is to "appropriate" this land. You can learn more about this by searching out Julie's web pages and information about the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land.

I dined with Pastor Mark Holman and his family following the worship service at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, which is located close to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which I will discuss in my next blog. The second picture was taken from the grounds of the Augusta Victoria Hospital and looks out toward the Dead Sea. He had taken me there and pointed out that the walls being constructed by the Israelis often separate the places where arabs live from where they work. I have tried to show this by two black arrows. I show this so that you will be aware of some of the dynamics going on. Our Lutheran Church is there to help us to do just that (to help us understand). More later. Happy Epiphany!

This Year in Jerusalem

December 13, 2007
Greetings as we continue to move through Advent, preparing to celebrate the coming of Jesus in his first visit and awaiting his second coming. I have made plans to visit Jerusalem and Palestine during the winter break here at the seminary. I have made contact with ELCA Lutherans there and intend to view first hand the monuments of the past but also to learn of the present struggles for justice and peace, for Christians, Palestinians and Jews in this troubled land where Jesus once walked.

The first picture is of an icon in the Episcopal Church in Maadi, a suburb of Cairo, where I worship and have assisted the priest, the Rev. Paul-Gordon Chandler as preacher and celebrant when he was on a book tour. I mentioned earlier that his new book: "Pilgrims of Christ on the Muslim Road, Exploring a New Path between Two Faiths", has been released. In return, he came to present his insights at our "Scholar's Seminar" and to meet with the graduate students class to dialogue about Muslim-Christian relations.

Icons, like this one of the baptism of Jesus, are present in many churches in this region, and developed as early Christian art sought to connect the divine reality with the human, to have heavenly presence touch earthly items and events. As you can observe, there is less concern to produce accurate human forms and landscapes. The gold background and the angel invite the viewer to come in contact with something holy and sacred in what is historical and worldly. In preparation for my trip to Jerusalem and Palestine, I have been reading a recent work by Andrew S. Jacobs, a southern Californian, entitled "The Holy Land and Christian Empire in Late Antiguity". He points out how the Christians converted the historic space of the Jews into sacred place of the followers of Christ. They replaced, erased and appropriated, what had been cherished by the Hebrews in "their promised land". From Constantine, the first "Christian" emperor, and from his mother Helena, the city of Jerusalem, developed more and more into a pilgrimage destination for pious Christians, a place to honor and preserve the events and spaces of the life, death and resurrection of Christ. The "true cross" was found, and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher constructed on the spot by tradition where Jesus had been buried.

When the Muslims conquered the city of Jerusalem, they too replaced, erased and appropriated the space of others for their sacred place, constructing the Dome of the Rock to honor the place where the prophet Mohammad had been transported to heaven in a vision and to honor the place where by tradition God had demanded the sacrifice of Abraham's son Issac. Hans Kung, in his book "Islam, Past, Present and Future", comments that this appropiation was to show that "Islam has the primacy, because it has renewed the original religion of Abraham, contrary to Jewish and Christian falsifications (p. 206)". This, just a brief note on the history of this space as sacred place for three of the world's major religions, brings us up the the present and the talks between Palestinians and Israelis, complicated in many ways by the status of Jerusalem. More on this later, but for now, pray for the just peace of Jerusalem.

My second picture brings us back to Cairo. It is of the entrance to the newly renovated church for the Armenian Patriarch, one of the several Orthodox expressions in Egypt. Here too symbols of the divine are merged with the human to suggest that this space set aside for worship is a holy place, where God comes to meet us in his love and grace. That too is the message of Christmas, the incarnation "coming in the flesh" of the divine. May God bless us as we continue to make way for Christ to enter our lives.

(One more note about our class discussions on the theme of Jewish, Christian and Muslim relations, and "Zionism", the movement from the 19th century for Jews to "reclaim" their homeland. I used two sources to help in our discussions. One is available from the ELCA: "Churchwide Strategy for Engagement in Israel and Palestine." The other is by a former colleague, Dr. Peter Pettit, who is now the director for the Institute for Jewish-Christian Understanding at Muhlenberg College. It is entitled: "Christian Zionism from a Perspective of Jewish-Christian Relations." You may be interesting in reviewing these as part of the total picture of the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations now going on.
Blessings and peace to all, Roger

Refugee Work at St. Andrews

Monday, December 3, 2007

Greetings from Egypt. I hope that all is well. I want to take this opporunity to say a few words about the refugee ministry which the ELCA supports here in Cairo. The picture I am sending is of some students in the school at St. Andrews who came from the Sudan in the several years. They sang some Christian songs for us at Friday worship. There are less refugees coming now, in part because some areas of the Sudan are not at war. However, the situation is such that the Sudanese here in Egypt will need to remain. So the refugee program has shifted to providing the services these people need for the long term. A workshop at the church encourages artists among them to produce goods to be sold. Language classes in English and in Arabic help the families to get along here. A cirriculum has been devised which prepares students for formal education in Egyptian schools of higher education. Often classes include students of various age levels because the many could not have a regular schedule before in their troubled home land. There are over 100 students at the primary school level and over 50 in the secondary grades. Three ELCA personel assist in this program, a couple who has previously done refugees work in Palestine and a young woman who directs the adult education program. Write me if you are interested in more information and I will put you in touch with these people.

Dr. Hans Kung spoke in Egypt at the America University in Cairo on Sunday, December 2. His book "Islam, Past, Present, & Future" has recently been translated into English. He had already written works on Judaism and Christianity. His hope is that the world will move away from being "a clash of civilizations" (Islam and the West), and reach back to the foundations of the three religions to see what we share in common. He expresses this hope (maybe it could be an Advent prayer for us all)

No peace among nations without peace among the religions

No peace among the religions without dialogue between the religions

No dialogue between the religions without global ethical standards

No survival of our globe without a global ethic, a world ethic, supported by

both the religious and the non-religious.

Now retired after a long and often controversial career as a Catholic theologian, he heads an institute in Germany called the Global Ethic Foundation. His is one of the voices dedicated to lasting peace in a world so fractured by hatred and violence. He writes that we need to change from a self-righetous arrogance to a critical awareness of the perplexing interdependece of present-day society. Though well aware of the present situations, he encouraged us not to lose hope.

May hope come with this season when we await the coming of the Christ child. Roger

Message from Muslim Leaders

November 13, 2007. Every second Tuesday at the seminary there is an event called the "Scholar's Seminar", begun by previous coordinators and in which I have some part for arranging who speaks. Today a visiting professor from Norway, Dr. Jan Opsal, reviewed a recent letter by 138 Muslim leaders throughout the world to Christians. You can read about it by going to "Come to a Common Word" on your web site and to the ELCA web page and searching out Dr. Mark Hansen's response as leader of Lutherans in the U.S. and the Lutheran World Federation. My first picture is of the El Fath mosque near central Cairo, and for most of us from the west all this may seem majestic, mysterious, and a bit overpowering. After three months in Egypt it is still very much the same as when I first came, majestic, mysterious, and more than a bit overpowering. Here are some of the comments which Dr. Jan shared and some of the reflections by the group which gathered to hear him (my second picture). He noted that of the 138 the vast majority are from the Middle East and only one woman signed the original letter, though another has added her name to a subsequent list. Missing from the signers are Muslim scholars from countries in Asia where many, many Muslims live. This letter is a follow up to a letter written by 38 Muslim scholars in response to an address by Pope Benedict XVI a year ago. That letter was very polemical, as was the declaration by the Pope which started that exchange.

Dr. Jan pointed out that the tone of this letter by the leaders is less so, and that it focuses on common themes in the Christian and Muslim holy books. It deals with the responses of humans to God - to love God about all else and to love our neighbors as ourselves. It does not discuss the love of God to us, nor does it suggest any specific steps for further dialogue or action among the faith communities. It does represent a significant number of the diverse Muslim community speaking together, brought about by an institute in Jordan.

Comments from the persons who attended suggested it would be well for world Christian leaders to whom the letter is addressed to contact leaders in the Arab Christian churches in this region for their reflections in framing their responses. Some felt that the letter is really intended to address Christians living in western Europe and the United States. Others shared that living with and under Muslim majorities continues to be difficult, a far cry from a love for neighbor which is voiced in the letter. Do you have any comments you want to share?

The schedule is now set for January and for the spring term here. This Norwegian professor will present a course on women in the Qurán and the Bible (with some suggestions from Dr. Susan Hedahl, a professor from Gettyburg Seminary who visited here last week). There will also be a January course on the history of Christianity in Syria. Dr. Mark Swanson, now at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago and former director here, will find time to tutor some students in Muslim-Christian relations. Studies in Hebrew, in the Coptic language, and the Letters of Paul will be part of the Biblical studies concentration starting in February and I will teach the course on Christianity in the Middle East, Part II (from the coming of Islam to 1900).

Blessings to you all in your ministry as we move toward Advent. Roger

More about the Master's Program

Oct. 23. Greetings again from Cairo, Egypt. I want to say more about the Master's degree program here at the seminary. In particular, I wish to tell you more about the themes of the papers which the students write as part of earning a degree. Four second year students pictured earlier will spend the spring term of 2008 on this work. But first, a picture to introduce all of this. When Dr. Robert Smith who directs the ELCA effort in the Middle East visited here last month, we went the ancient section of Cairo, where this ruin of a Roman fortress and several early churches and a synagogue are located. Robert and the missionaries of the ELCA here in Cairo talked about our responsibility to "accompany" the peoples of this place and be prepared to learn from them as well as to share what we can with them.

....The first student, Sungmin, will write about the disappearance of the Nubian Christian church, following the conquest of Egypt and the destruction of this Roman fortess by the Muslims in the 7th century a.d. She will be using unpublished sources in an attempt to determine why this Christian community did not survive when others did.

....The second student, Nashat, will research the development of a Protestant Christian translation of the Bible into Arabic, which was done in the 19th century, and its adequacy for the mission of the church today. One of the ramification of the Arab conquest of this region was the gradual replacement of languages like Coptic in everyday life, and so if Christians wish to witness, it is in the common language of people in this part of the world.

....A third student, Magdy, will tell us about the impact of Protestant Christian missionaries who introduced programs of adult education and Sunday schools to the established Orthodox churches of this region. Part of the missionary effort from the United States and Europe beginning in the 19th century was to work within these established Christian communities, sharing new innovations for their ministries.

This second picture, showing the flight to Egypt of Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus to escape the slaughter of the young children in Bethlehem, is also from the site in old Cairo, traditionally held to be the temporary home of the holy family. There have been many stories of peoples fleeing persecution and warfare, and in our time none has been more tragic than the bloodshed in the Sudan which still continues after 30 years. I hear reports from Sudanese students at this seminary that when Christ is preached in the midst of that conflict, young people still come forward to commit their lives to Christ.

....Daniel, a student from the Sudan, is writing his thesis on the concept of suffering which St. Paul presents in his 2nd Letter to the Corinthians. It will have a special meaning and relevance for him, and for his people, and maybe for all of us. I will keep you informed about the progress of these papers.

Soon, I will write again, and give you more information about the Sudanese refugee community in Egypt. We have three ELCA missionaries working with them. More later. I am well and hope that you all are. Peace, Roger