Julie Rowe

Please join in prayer with your sisters and brothers in The Lutheran World Federation  for Dr. Tawfiq Nasser who is undergoing surgery today at Stanford Hospital in Palo Alto. Dr. Nasser, CEO of Augusta Victoria Hospital (AVH) in Jerusalem has been instrumental in bringing remarkable improvements to the care, treatment and administration of AVH during challenging times.

The LWF and the ELCA recently issued an action alert to resolve a financial crisis created by the non-payment of $18 million in fees for patients that were referred to the hospital by the Palestinian Authority. Find out how you can help.

Please include Tawfiq, his family, those who care for him and the patients and staff at AVH in your prayers.

Rev. Munib A. Younan, bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, issued a statement against military intervention in Syria. See the full text below.

JERUSALEM – With many people around the world, I am deeply troubled by the apparent use of chemical weapons inside Syria.  Such weapons have no place in our world and their use by any party is unacceptable under any circumstance. While the use of chemical weapons is wrong, the forms of intervention being predicted thus far can do little to bring a positive outcome.

Even after the vote from the House of Commons in the United Kingdom, some Western powers continue to prepare plans for military intervention in Syria. Such military intervention threatens to bring even greater suffering and instability to communities throughout Syria and the region as a whole. We in the Middle East have witnessed several interventions from Western powers. We see that the countries that have been the targets for such intervention have neither democracy nor security. The recent history of Western interventions in the Middle East has brought only greater hatred and violence.

The only ones who will benefit from Western military intervention in Syria will be extremists on all sides. The violent ambitions of extremists within all traditions in the Middle East—Muslims, Christians, and Jews, among others—will be stoked by the fuel of even greater military destruction. As an Arab Christian, I am concerned for the effects this violence will have on every community in Syria, whether they are Sunni, Shiite, Alawite, Druze, or Christian.

Syria’s civil war threatens to tear the fabric of the country. Syrians have suffered from the presence of foreign fighters on all sides and the intransigent self-interests of both regional and global powers. The situation in Syria will be solved not with bombs but with diplomatic efforts and true dialogue among Syrians of goodwill. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said in response to the conflict in Vietnam, “The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.”

I call on all people to resist the threat of military intervention in Syria. Arab and Middle Eastern Christians and Christians throughout the world have a responsibility to raise a critical public voice, thus contributing to civil society. Our primary concern is not for abstract notions of national interest but for the flourishing of human communities. To choose the path of diplomacy brings the Middle East closer to the goal of peace. Such a choice is not weakness, but the sign of peace and security.

—

Rt. Rev. Munib A. Younan Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land

Text from Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land

CHICAGO (ELCA) — The United States and its president have a role to play to stop the atrocities in Egypt and allow for the self-determination of that nation to be practiced, according to top Middle East and U.S. Lutheran church leaders.

In a joint Aug. 19 letter to U.S. President Barack Obama, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), and the Rev. Munib A. Younan, bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, expressed their concern to the president over the current situation in Egypt and its implication throughout the region.

“We hear from fellow Christian leaders and our Muslim friends that churches and mosques are being used as political tools,” wrote Hanson and Younan. “We are aware that there are some who are trying to transform the political struggles of the region into religious wars.”

The two leaders wrote that what is happening in Egypt is not only a struggle for democracy but that this crisis could transform “Egypt into a battlefield of extremist powers that will not allow the Egyptians to live in dignity. If not quickly resolved, the crisis there will affect the whole region, and we will enter again into another vicious cycle of hatred, bloodshed and war.”

Recalling the president’s speech in Cairo five years ago, where Obama emphasized the right of every nation to determine its own policies, Hanson and Younan wrote that the anarchy afflicting Egypt “is creating fertile ground for all kinds of groups to intervene, endangering the possibility for healthy self-determination.”

Hanson and Younan wrote that such a situation will “only endanger all moderate forces in Egypt — be they Coptic or Muslim — and will only give a boost for non-democratic groups to hold Egypt and the whole Middle East hostage.”

Making it clear that no religion has a monopoly on extremism, Hanson and Younan said that in the Middle East, people are confronted by religiously sanctioned political extremism — a threat to common citizens and persons of faith.

Hanson and Younan urged President Obama to define a clear line of U.S. policy toward the region in light of Islamic extremism. “The appearance that the U.S. is investing in one group alone has already exacerbated sectarian tensions. Not all Islamists are political extremists. Peace-seeking Egyptians, whether Coptic or Muslim, are committed to the well-being of all their neighbors and to the promotion of democracy and a vibrant civil society.”

They also urged the president to take every possible step to stop the violence, actively seek peace, play a constructive role in Egypt for the sake of humanity and encourage all groups to gather at one table to construct a road map toward reconciliation, which would make provisions for human rights and fundamental freedoms.

(Text from ELCA NEWS SERVICE)

Full text of the letter to President Obama

The Rt. Rev. Munib A. Younan, President of the Lutheran World Federation and Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, addressed the ELCA Churchwide Assembly today, August 15, 2013.

I continue to believe that security for the State of Israel depends on justice for Palestinians, and that freedom and justice for Palestinians depend on Israel’s security. We are in a symbiotic relationship. It continues to be my vision that Palestinians will one day see the image of God in their Israeli neighbors and Israelis equally see the image of God in us, their Palestinian neighbors. For it is only when we recognize our common humanity and hold each other in dignity and respect and mutually recognize each other’s human, civil, religious, and political rights. Only then will the Holy Land become a promised land of milk and honey for Israelis and Palestinians alike. I pray for the fulfilment of this vision and that we can experience peace and justice in our days.

We are tired of wars and hatred. We continue to be committed to the vision that our children and grandchildren will experience peace based on justice and reconciliation based on forgiveness. I ask you to pray for the Middle East. Please pray for Syria, Egypt, Palestine and Israel. Pray that God may open the eyes of our leaders to say “no more hatred, no more weapons, no more bloodshed—only dignity for every person and justice for every nation.” Please pray for the LWF and the ministry of the ELCJHL.”

Click here to read the full greeting from LWF President, Bishop Munib Younan.

ELCA NEWS SERVICE
June 26, 2013

ELCA works to provide relief to people internally displaced in Syria

CHICAGO (ELCA) — In response to the humanitarian crisis in Syria, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is providing more than $540,000 to the Syriac Orthodox Church to support its outreach to people displaced from their homes but remain in Syria because of the violent conflict. According to news reports, the conflict in Syria has claimed 100,000 lives since the fighting began in 2011.

Funds from ELCA Lutheran Disaster Response will provide for six-month’s worth of rent for 500 families, health services and supplies for children and infants, and support medical programs and surgeries.

On a recent trip to Chicago, His Eminence Archbishop Jean Kawak, patriarchal office director of the Syriac Orthodox Church in Damascus, discussed the effects of the fighting on the entire population of Syria, across all sectarian and ethnic divides.

“It is not only the Christian(s) who are harmed or affected by this situation. I’m scared about the entire Syria, but because we (Christians) are a minority in Syria, the minorities are usually more affected by a civil war or a problem like our Syrian problems,” said Kawak.

Although more than 1.5 million people have fled Syria and are seeking refuge in neighboring countries, there are an estimated 4.25 million Syrians who are internally displaced. According to the Rev. Robert O. Smith, the ELCA is one of the first churches in North America to provide aid to Syrians internally displaced from their homes.

“We started exploring what the Syriac church was doing to respond to the situation in Syria and then how the ELCA might be able to accompany them in that work,” said Smith, the ELCA’s area program director for the Middle East and North Africa. “It became apparent that the aid was not getting to the internally-displaced people,” said Smith.

Lutheran Disaster Responds funds will primarily support Christians in Syria, who have no other source of relief.

“Christians are the most vulnerable of all the vulnerable populations (in Syria), because they often can’t access the little aid that is available. In order to help the Christian population, the ELCA has to accompany churches in Syria, but the ELCA does not choose to work with only Christians,” said Smith.

Kawak explained that all communities in Syria are suffering from the violence that is spreading throughout the country, stressing that the church will not turn away anyone who needs assistance.

“I’m proud to say my nephew in Damascus asked me to help a Muslim family. The family was in a suburb of Damascus where it was attacked and destroyed,” said Kawak. “I told him let them come to me and I gave them money and medicine and many other things. And I’m really proud of him because he asked me to help a Muslim.”

“You see this is our life. And they tried many times to come and see me and say thank you. I told them you don’t have to thank me. This is my duty and I’m happy to do it. Please come always. We need each other; we need to be together. And we hope that everybody, the extremists from all sides, we need and we pray for them to understand that we have to respect they are human beings because they are human beings.”

Kawak said, “This is our mission to help everybody. This is an instrument of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He told us to help everybody, regardless his color, his religion, his sect, his ethnic group. We need to do it and we are helping to do it.”

The ELCA also provides aid to Syrian refugees living in other countries and participates in humanitarian assistance in partnership with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, along with other Lutheran companion churches and partner organizations. Earlier this year, the ELCA provided $100,000 to support the needs of Syrian refugees at the Za’atri refugee camp in Jordan. The funds were sent to The Lutheran World Federation, which helps manage camp operations in cooperation with the Jordanian authorities.

The federation, which is managing the camp operations, is a global communion of 143 member churches in 79 countries worldwide. The ELCA is the communion’s only member church from the United States.

Text from ELCA News Service

Beirut, Lebanon: On May 22 2013, Lutheran World Federation (LWF) President, Bishop Munib Younan of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL), spoke during the World Council of Churches (WCC) and Middle East Council of Churches (MECC) conference on Christian Presence and Witness in the Middle East. “We do not live in the mentality of the ghetto, nor in the mentality of a minority complex, nor do we live as dhimmi (dependent) people,” said Bishop Younan. “We have always been, as Arab Christians, building our societies, loyal to our countries and nationalities, bringing hope in hopeless situations.”

Read the LWF news story here.

For the full speech click here.

In a letter to President Obama on April 12, ELCA leaders urged Obama to “take steps to find new avenues toward peace and resolve the war through diplomatic means” in Syria.  In their letter, the ELCA presiding bishop and four synod bishops offered their appreciation for Obama’s chosen “path of restraint,” particularly as the bishops have heard louder calls in recent weeks “for the United States to provide lethal military assistance to the Syrian opposition,” they wrote.

“The volatility of the conflict in Syria continues to lead to violence, suffering, death and people fleeing for safety,” said the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the ELCA, in an interview. “Acknowledging the conflict’s complexity should not cause us to silence our voices or refrain from acts of compassion,” said Hanson. “The letter to President Obama calls for restraint in actions by the United States that could escalate the violence and for renewed efforts to find a resolution that will become a foundation for a lasting peace and a Syrian society that experiences justice and reconciliation.”

Hanson said that through the ELCA’s partnership with The Lutheran World Federation, this church “is aiding Syrian refugees who have fled to Jordan.” The ELCA continues to participate in humanitarian assistance in partnership with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, along with other Lutheran companion churches and partner organizations. According to the United Nations, more than 70,000 people have been killed during the two-year civil war in Syria.

“We are steadfast in our support of immediate and unhindered access to assistance by all available means for victims of this war,” the bishops wrote in their letter.

Click here  for the full text of the ELCA leaders’ letter.

Click here to send your own letter to President Obama.

Click here to read more about the current humanitarian situation in Syria.

(text above from ELCA NEWS SERVICE)

In their Easter message, the Heads of Churches in Jerusalem “call upon all Christians from around the ecumenical world to come and visit with our churches and walk with the living stones of the Holy Land  in the footsteps of our risen Lord.” If you are interested in responding to this call take a look at Peace Not Wall’s resources for traveling to the Holy Land.

Below is the full text of the Easter message:

“He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.
Come and see the place where he lay.” Matthew 28:6

We, the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem, bless our faithful people in this region and the people of God everywhere in the name of the risen Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Each year the Church calls us to celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ through Divine Liturgies and Paschal ceremonies and gatherings. The Church in the Holy Land offers what no other church around the world can offer – Pilgrimage in the land where it all happened. Through many prayers, fasts, and holy journeys, this land we call Holy became a fifth gospel. Indeed, our Easter greetings come from the heart of the City of Hope, Resurrection and the Empty Tomb.

As Heads of Churches in Jerusalem, we call upon all Christians from around the ecumenical world to come and visit with our churches and walk with the living stones of the Holy Land in the footsteps of our risen Lord. And for those who are not able to make their pilgrimage to the Holy Land, we appeal to them to hold the peoples of this land in their prayers, particularly the Christian presence that keeps dwindling and faces existential challenges throughout the Middle East.

The holy fire on Holy Saturday and Easter Vigil remind us, and the entire world, of the ‘Light of the Risen Lord’, which illumines the whole world, even in the darkest places of the earth. Our world today is full of false idols that separate people from the light of Christ and the truth of his Gospel. The Christian presence here in the Mother City of our faith continues to serve as a beacon of light of the risen Christ, which the first disciples witnessed here at the empty sepulcher in Jerusalem.

As a continued witness of the resurrection, the Church in the Holy Land urges all people of faith and goodwill around the world, especially those in authority, to strive for justice and peace among the nations. In particular, pray with us for the situation in Syria; in Lebanon; in Palestine and Israel; in Egypt; in Iraq, and wherever there is political unrest. Pray for all victims of violence and oppression, for prisoners, for those who live with the lack of security, and those who are displaced and refugees, especially here in our land.

May the light of the risen Lord shine upon the whole world and in our region, and may we all be raised with Christ into life victorious. Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed.

Alleluia!

Patriarch Theophilos III, Greek Orthodox Patriarchate
Patriarch Fouad Twal, Latin Patriarchate
Patriarch Norhan Manougian, Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Patriarchate
Very Rev. Pierbattista Pizzaballa, ofm, Custos of the Holy Land
Archbishop Anba Abraham, Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate, Jerusalem
Archbishop Swerios Malki Murad, Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate
Aba Fissiha Tsion, Locum Tenens of the Ethiopian Orthodox Patriarchate
Archbishop Joseph-Jules Zerey, Greek-Melkite-Catholic Patriarchate
Archbishop Moussa El-Hage, Maronite Patriarchal Exarchate
Bishop Suheil Dawani, Episcopal Church of Jerusalem and the Middle East
Bishop Munib Younan, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land
Bishop Pierre Melki, Syrian Catholic Patriarchal Exarchate
Msgr. Joseph Antoine Kelekian, Armenian Catholic Patriarchal Exarchate

Taken from Independent Catholic News website

Ask President Obama to meet with religious leaders when he visits the Middle East next month; call for a halt to settlement activity; ask his delegation to visit Augusta Victoria Hospital

President Obama is scheduled to visit Israel, Palestine and Jordan next month, his first such visit as president. The president has often sought out the views of U.S. religious leaders through his White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and other meetings. It will be important for the President to hear the voices of faith leaders during his visit to the region as well. The Council of Religious Institutions of the Holy Land consists of leaders of the three Abrahamic faiths, including Bishop Munib Younan of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land and President of The Lutheran World Federation.

As you may be aware, the Council’s long-awaited study of the “Portrayal of the Other” in Palestinian and Israeli school books was recently released and generated much discussion, some of it critical. However, the Council’s researchers utilized identical, standardized scientific methods for this work. Now, as much as ever, the Council needs support from us and U.S. leaders for this effort as well as its overall mission to advance the sacred values of each faith, “to prevent religion from being used as a source of conflict, and to promote mutual respect, a just and comprehensive peace and reconciliation between people of all faiths in the Holy Land and worldwide.”

Please contact the White House and ask President Obama to meet with the Council of Religious Institutions of the Holy Land during his visit.

As noted in a report issued late last year by the United Nations (U.N.) on the humanitarian impact of the Israeli settlement policy on Palestinians, since 1967, Israel has established about 150 settlements (residential and others) in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem; in addition to some 100 “outposts” erected by settlers without official authorization. Three new settlements were approved in 2012 by retroactively ‘authorizing’ such outposts. More than 500,000 people live in these settlements, which are against international law. Additionally, in 2012, one Palestinian was killed and approximately 1,300 injured by Israeli settlers or security forces in incidents directly or indirectly related to settlements, including demonstrations.

Furthermore, a recent U.N. report states that: “The establishment of the settlements in the West Bank including East Jerusalem is a mesh of construction and infrastructure leading to a creeping annexation that prevents the establishment of a contiguous and viable Palestinian State and undermines the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. The settlements have been established and developed at the expense of violating international human rights laws and international humanitarian law, as applicable in the OPT [Occupied Palestinian Territory] as notably recognized by the 2004 ICJ [International Court of Justice] Advisory Opinion.”

Repeated warnings by U.S. officials to stop the growth of settlements have fallen on deaf ears, as settlement expansion has advanced at an accelerated rate and could render a viable two-state solution virtually impossible.

Please contact the White House and ask President Obama to urge him to demand, during his visit, a halt to all settlement activity.

The Lutheran World Federation has operated the Augusta Victoria Hospital for the benefit of Palestinian refugees since 1950. The ELCA and other churches around the world have been strong supporters of this effort to meet human need and be a sign of hope over the years. In addition, the U.S. government has supported the hospital’s work, particularly in the field of oncology through significant grants for crucial equipment. In March 2010, Dr. Jill Biden, wife of the vice-president, visited the hospital during her husband’s visit to Jerusalem.

Please contact the White House and ask President Obama to have one or more members of his delegation visit the Augusta Victoria Hospital.

Click here to write to President Obama now

Click here to share your concerns for the President’s upcoming trip with Secretary of State John Kerry

Click here to share those concerns with your members of Congress