Oh Little Town of Bethlehem - Church of the Nativity

Last Tuesday, five of my friends from my program and I crossed the border into Bethlehem.

(Another 'duh' moment I had right before I came to Israel was that even though Bethlehem is less than half an hour away from Jerusalem, it is not in Israel, it is in the West Bank - it is an 'A' area meaning that it is under Palestinian control and Israeli citizens are not allowed in (unless they have another passport or special pass)

Needless to say, it takes a little bit of effort to get there. We caught an 'Arab' bus, which took us to the border, and then we had to cross by foot through the terminal and checkpoint. Going in was no problem. We then caught a cab to the Church of the Nativity. On the way, our cab driver told us how economically hard it had been in Bethlehem since the creation of the Wall - now Israelis cannot enter, and even tourists only enter to see the church and then leave, rather than staying for the night or spending money there. He said this had been especially true since the Gaza War, which caused tourism in the West Bank to all but disappear. He was very happy to drive us to the church and offered to wait for us and drive us wherever else we wanted to go.

To get to the place where the manger and Star of Bethlehem is, you have to descend stairs. We were right behind a huge tourist group, so it took quite a long time to get down there. The area is all covered in red and gold velvet cloth and is lit with candles - it has a very 'royal' feel to it. Groups at the bottom were singing hymns in Russian, which made the atmosphere all the more religious feeling.
This is the area that marks the manger. Many people reach candles in and light their flames from the candles inside. There were several people meditating nearby, but everyone else was taking tons of pictures, so I took one as well, even though I felt weird about it.

This star marks the place where it is traditionally believed that Jesus was born. It is covered by a sort of altar, and to touch it, you have to get down on your hands and knees. Many people crawl and kiss the star, or reach their hand in the center part, which is hollow.

The church is large and cavernous, and the stone makes it have an almost cold feeling inside. Of course, it is also extremely intricately decorated, with ornate crosses and all sorts of lanterns hanging from the ceiling.

Here is the entrance and outside of the church of the Nativity.

Nazareth

After spending the morning in the Galilee area, we took a cab to Nazareth, the town where Jesus grew up. Before going, I somehow pictured that Nazareth would be a dusty, Africa-styel bustling town. Not so much. It is large, with modern buildings, lots of cars with pumping music, all sorts of stores and terrible traffic. None of this, of course, is depicted in my picture walking down one of the side streets:
While we were walking around, we saw this sign in front of a restaurant. Nothing inspires me to order a rack of lamb like seeing a cute little wooly lamb on a sign. eek.

In Nazareth, I found my new favorite church building in the world. The Church of the Annunciation, where the Catholics believe that Gabriel told Mary the reason she was pregnant (keep in mind that the Orthodox, Coptics, and many other denominations believe that this took place in different parts of the city and they all have their own cathedral or church commemorating it.) Here is a view of the church from above (everyone says it looks like a light house).

Here is a closer view of the outside:

And the inside. It has much more modern architecture than most of the churches I have seen in Israel.

However, the thing that makes this church my new favorite in the entire world is that it is a multi-cultural church. The creaters of the church petitioned countries all over the world to send in mosaic representations of Mary and Jesus. These mosaics are all over the inside of the church and all around the compound of the outside. This one is from Japan:

IndonesiaBrazil
And of course, South Africa
Another view of the inside.

Looking up.

There is also amazing stained glass everywhere. In my next life (or maybe just after I finish grad school), I am going to be a mosaic-maker and stained glass maker. Mark my words.

Here is the place (on the bottom floor) where it is believed that the angel Gabriel talked to Mary.

Here is the outside of the church.

After walking around the compoud for quite a while, we wandered around the city for a bit and ran into the synagogue that stands in the place where it is believed that Jesus taught:

Before heading back to Tiberias, we hiked up the side of a mountain to view another church. (I forget which one). We were enjoying the view of the city and the outside of the church, when suddenly, we saw that the gates were closing (they are electronic). We went sprinting to them, and squeezed through JUST before they locked. It was all very Indiana Jones. However, three boys were not as lucky and they were locked in for a while until the guard came and let them out.

The Galilee: my mini-pilgrimage

Two weekends ago two of my girlfriends and I took off for the 'Sea of Galilee' - or Lake Kinneret, as it is known to Israelis. There we got to walk in the footsteps of Jesus along the routes that are believed to be the beginning of his ministry. We bussed to Tiberias on Thursday night, found a hostel, and the next morning, got up and caught a cab (we hired a cab by the hour, he charged about 100 NIS an hour) to take us to the sites.

Our first stop was the Church of the Multiplication in Taghba. This rock (under the alter) is where it is believed that Jesus multiplied the bread and fish.

The inside of the church of the multiplication.

Each of the churches we go to are full of candles that have been lit by worshipers. I thought this 'sea' of tea light candles was captivating.

Our second stop was Capharnaum, the home of Peter, where Jesus stayed during a good part of the beginning of his ministry.

Of course, to honor Peter, there was a statue with the engraving of the verse that refers to the rock upon which Jesus would build his church:

These are the ruins of Capernum, like every ancient site in Israel, era after era has built upon the same spot, and ruins reflect this: Many of the ruins are from the Roman era.

These tiles are from the floor of the room in Peter's home in which it is believed that Jesus stayed.

In Capernum, we took a while to enjoy the view of the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus (and Peter) walked on water.

The day that we went up the coast of the Sea of Galilee, the Mount of Beatitudes, where Jesus delivered the Sermon on the Mount, was closed, so we had to go back the next morning. This is the view from the mount: just unbelievably gorgeous. It was an incredibly peaceful and beautiful place, it is not hard to imagine it being chosen as the place where Jesus would have taught.

The church commemorating the Sermon on the Mount.

These are my faithful companions, K.C. and Katie. These girls are amazing and have added endlessly to my experience here. It has been such fun to travel with them. Katie's head is half cut off in this picture, which is ok because unfortunately she got incredibly ill an hour or so before this photo and actually had to end up staying in Tiberias an extra night. I am happy to report, however, that she survived. :)

Publish Post

Some random pictures from the Christian Quarter

Church of the Holy Sepulcher

Last week I finally had the opportunity to get back to the Old City and visit the Christian quarter. The highlight was the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Sep-pull-ker). The church marks
the place where it is believed that Jesus was
crucified, cleaned, buried in a tomb, and rose from the dead.










I was amazed by the opulence of the place - it was the most ornate place I have perhaps ever been. The picture to the left is of the place where Jesus is said to have hung from the cross - (you have to climb stairs to get up the hill of Golgotha and to the height of where he was hung). Just look at the ornateness!! I know that to so many, this is a way of worship, but to me, it completely overwhelmed the space and - overwhelmed me.

It was so completely surreal to stand in the places from which all of Christianity is based - and look around at all of the different versions of Christians... it was actually incredibly overwhelming to me. I wasn't entirely sure what to think or how to feel about it. On almost every wall hundreds of thousands of crosses had been carved in over the last several hundred years. It was utterly amazing. The picture below of the people sprawled on the ground is of the rock where it is believed that Jesus was cleaned when he was taken off of the cross. Many people would kneel near it, and rub all sorts of things over it in order to make them holy. I saw a lady take literally everything out of her purse, including her cell phone, ipod, kleenex, a pair of earrings and a nail file, and rub them all over the rock.


Wow - huh? To go to the place where my religion originated - that's big, right? HUGE, right? And yet - it was more than anything to me a moment where I realized that our religion, our spirituality, our theology - is something that is interpretable a million different ways, across a million different cultures and 6 billion different individuals. Just looking at even the way that this space had been utilized over the years was mind blowing - there were catholic quarters of building, and orthodox, and coptic, and fransiscan and armenian.... monks from allllll sorts of backgrounds - women completely covered, women in little tiny skirts with bellies showing - truly, it is amazing to me the number of ways that Christianity (and any religion for that matter) has been interpreted.

I have now had the chance to stand in the holiest site for Christians, the holiest place for Jews, and the most sacred of places for Hindus - and ... I think I love religion less for all of it.

BUT I surely love people more and am continually amazed at humanity's continual search for divinity. And, at the very end of the day, still....there is no doubt that...

:)