Transfiguration Sunday, February 22

In the morning, we packed up and, using our cab drivers from the previous night, headed to the King Hussein Bridge. Within 2 km of the bridge, we had to change taxis to the terminal, where we went through arrival and departure procedures, security, paid our exit tax and then took the JETT bus across the bridge. They took our luggage to send it through security and sent us through. Then, things became interesting.

We approached border control as a group. When asked for its leader, I presented myself to the officer, who cross examined me but good – a story only to be told in person. Then, we had to go through another passport check before we were able to collect our luggage and seek Chelsea and our transportation. Though we seemed to be running late, Chelsea arrived about 5 minutes after we had emerged from the terminal. It was so good to see her!

An interesting point: Chelsea noted that, upon entering Israel, luggage (and the people matching them) is tagged with a number from 1-6 indicating their perceived “security threat.” (Consider it a numeric version of the Homeland Security color chart.) #1 would be assigned to an Israeli, indicating no threat to security, while #6 is the highest threat. We were tagged as #4s.

Al Quds University
Al Quds (the Arabic name for Jerusalem) University is located in Abu Dis, in East Jerusalem. Most students are Muslim and a few Christian. We began by visiting Abu-Jihad Center for Political Prisoners' Affairs, a museum that provides a remarkable historic panorama of Palestinians (mostly men) who have been imprisoned through the years. We learned how Palestinian intellectuals managed to set up universities within prisons, holding courses and writing volumes on topics ranging from biology to art and novels. With little bits and pieces gathered from their surroundings, prisoners have created some amazing artwork.

We then sat down with four Al Quds students, who shared with us the challenges they face merely in order to get to the university, to study, to become educated and to prepare to work to build up their society. We learned that, in Jerusalem, a degree from Al Quds is considered invalid; as a result, many Al Quds alumni go abroad for graduate study in order to obtain advanced degrees that “legitimate” their education and open doors to more vocational opportunities.

We will all remember the story told by a young woman of how soldiers surrounded her home and sent her family outside so they could search the house. Her mother, concerned that her 3 year old grandson, who was napping upstairs, would awaken to find soldiers carrying automatic weapons standing over his bed, pleaded with the soldiers not to disturb him. Dismissing her, the soldiers pushed her back so that she fell onto the pavement, suffering a fatal head injury. This took place in front of the young woman and her father and happened just last September. Her pain is still so very raw. And yet, she joined the other students in saying, “We keep going on; we keep having hope. We have no choice.”

There is in Arabic a word, “samood,” which means steadfastness. We see evidence of this all around us, in every person we meet.

Skype Worship

We arrived at the International Center in Bethlehem just in the nick of time to set up for our Skype liturgy with the congregation in Ann Arbor. Chelsea and the ICB’s media specialist made haste to set up our electronic arrangements as well as to provide local bread and wine for the Eucharist. It was a wonderful experience to be one congregation in two locations. We were left with a new understanding of what it means to be one body in Christ.

PS