Repentance
Lent is about repentance. Often that is described as being sorry and aligning our lives with God, which I am sure it is. But I suspect it is more, and being in this place of division has helped me see that.
There is a line in scripture that says that the sins of the fathers are visited on their children, and on their children's children. To put it another way, the consequences of our sins don't stop just because we confess our sins. The consequences continue. The relationships are still fractured. Injustice is still imbedded. The other is still suffering the pain.
That is certainly true here. Israel and Palestine suffers from the sins of the past. The centuries of abuse, humiliation and murder of the Jewish people by Europeans in particular, that culminated in the Holocaust. All of Europe is accountable, and it is not enough to say that we will not forget. Arab and Palestinian refused to agree to the formation of a Jewish State and through violent means tried very hard to prevent it. They only gave up when it became obvious they just couldn't win. Jewish terrorists and soldiers evicted Palestinians from a huge number of villages, and then confiscated all the land. They are still confiscating land and building new settlements on it. All of us could say sorry. But that would achieve nothing.
What does need to happen is for each of the parties to recognize the sins of the past, and to work to rectify what happened in the past. For Europeans that means working to ensure that there is a safe strong Jewish state. But that also means ensuring that Palestinians are treated well, justly and with respect. It means working to build a strong Palestinian economy in Palestine and in Israel. Only then will Israel be what is needed, strong and safe. For Palestinian and Jew it means owning and confessing the violence of the past, and working to rebuild or build for the first time honest respectful and just relationships between the two. For Arabs it means owning their role in the brutality of the past, and working to rebuild Palestinian economy.
I believe that we as Christians could play a really important role in this, and are already. I cannot tell Palestinians how to work this out. They are the ones suffering through 60 years of humiliation and abuse. But my hope is that one day Christians will take the lead, confess the past, and find ways to build new ways of being together with Jewish Israelis.
Another example of this is the Druze violence. The Christian community justly wants compensation, and for that to be so burdensome that it will make Druze think again before they embark on such violence. My take on that is that it ignores the role of the Christian boy in all this, cursing the Druze boy. That was wrong. What would happen if the Christian community were repentant of that, and then undertook to rebuild the relationships? Again, easy for me to say from the comfort of the sidelines.
Part of the prayer Third Order Franciscans pray each day talks about winning others to love. That is what this is about. Winning people to love. And loving means undoing the wrongs of the past so that a new present and future can be built. I am not sure this is making sense. It made much more sense in my head.
I will now pray the Prayer of Humble Access with more understanding. Yes I am forgiven. But my sin continues. Repentance occurs when I am willing to work to undo that sin for the other. As an individual that means what happened in my life. As a member of a community, it means owning what has happened in the past, and working to undo that.
When that happens, then there is Shalom/saleem.
There is a line in scripture that says that the sins of the fathers are visited on their children, and on their children's children. To put it another way, the consequences of our sins don't stop just because we confess our sins. The consequences continue. The relationships are still fractured. Injustice is still imbedded. The other is still suffering the pain.
That is certainly true here. Israel and Palestine suffers from the sins of the past. The centuries of abuse, humiliation and murder of the Jewish people by Europeans in particular, that culminated in the Holocaust. All of Europe is accountable, and it is not enough to say that we will not forget. Arab and Palestinian refused to agree to the formation of a Jewish State and through violent means tried very hard to prevent it. They only gave up when it became obvious they just couldn't win. Jewish terrorists and soldiers evicted Palestinians from a huge number of villages, and then confiscated all the land. They are still confiscating land and building new settlements on it. All of us could say sorry. But that would achieve nothing.
What does need to happen is for each of the parties to recognize the sins of the past, and to work to rectify what happened in the past. For Europeans that means working to ensure that there is a safe strong Jewish state. But that also means ensuring that Palestinians are treated well, justly and with respect. It means working to build a strong Palestinian economy in Palestine and in Israel. Only then will Israel be what is needed, strong and safe. For Palestinian and Jew it means owning and confessing the violence of the past, and working to rebuild or build for the first time honest respectful and just relationships between the two. For Arabs it means owning their role in the brutality of the past, and working to rebuild Palestinian economy.
I believe that we as Christians could play a really important role in this, and are already. I cannot tell Palestinians how to work this out. They are the ones suffering through 60 years of humiliation and abuse. But my hope is that one day Christians will take the lead, confess the past, and find ways to build new ways of being together with Jewish Israelis.
Another example of this is the Druze violence. The Christian community justly wants compensation, and for that to be so burdensome that it will make Druze think again before they embark on such violence. My take on that is that it ignores the role of the Christian boy in all this, cursing the Druze boy. That was wrong. What would happen if the Christian community were repentant of that, and then undertook to rebuild the relationships? Again, easy for me to say from the comfort of the sidelines.
Part of the prayer Third Order Franciscans pray each day talks about winning others to love. That is what this is about. Winning people to love. And loving means undoing the wrongs of the past so that a new present and future can be built. I am not sure this is making sense. It made much more sense in my head.
I will now pray the Prayer of Humble Access with more understanding. Yes I am forgiven. But my sin continues. Repentance occurs when I am willing to work to undo that sin for the other. As an individual that means what happened in my life. As a member of a community, it means owning what has happened in the past, and working to undo that.
When that happens, then there is Shalom/saleem.
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