Just before lockdown last year, the members of the first Ecumenical Pilgrimage to Jerusalem returned home having spent a week visiting the holy sites of the place of Jesus’ birth. We had to return slightly early because of the pandemic and were one of the last groups of pilgrims to visit the Holy Land.
The Israeli government has been quite successful in halting the spread of the pandemic by closing the borders, and its vaccination programme has been seen as an exemplary way of rolling out the all-important protection. But the toll of closing the country to visitors and the fact that the vaccine has not been rolled out in the same way to the Palestinians is a cause of much concern.
This is because many people in the Holy Land are, one way or another, involved in the tourist industry which underpins much of the economy, especially in those places where there are holy sites and pilgrims visit by the hundreds of thousands each year.
On Wednesday 3 March 2021, many of the pilgrims from the Ecumenical Pilgrimage gathered online and reminisced about the things that we had seen and experienced together. It was wonderful to see each other and to be able to talk in break-out groups about how our year had been and how it had felt as we came home and more or less went straight into lockdown.
Some were able to spend time together thinking about what they had seen and learned during the pilgrimage and praying about the situation in the Holy Land. Others had been frantically busy during lockdown and less able to look back. Whatever our situation in the past year, seeing the photographs from the trip and remembering some of the people we had met – especially Sister Alicia of the Community of the Comboni Sisters in Jerusalem – caused us to think about the situation in the Holy Land once again.
We recalled the wall built around the Comboni Sisters’ convent and how this kept the children out of the nursery even before lockdown. We thought about how hard it is for many people to find work and to feed their families even in more normal times, and we realised that, as hard as it has been for us all here in different ways, it has been harder for many of our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land. Their livelihoods have been taken away as the tourists and pilgrims have not been able to go. That is why the feeding programme which money from the Bishop’s Lent Call will help to fund is so important.
Many find themselves with no obvious means to keep the roof over their head or to provide for their families. Through the Diocese of Jerusalem, with which we are now formally linked, families will be provided for and so will have one less thing to worry about.
Many of us who were at the reunion very much look forward to the time when we can once again visit the Holy Sites and spend time with our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land, but we know that that may still be a way off. It seems likely that it will be the autumn at the earliest when pilgrims may return. That will be 18 months without income from tourism. Even then, the volume of pilgrims is likely to be much less.
Please pray for the situation in the Holy Land and for a will for equality and peace for the people of the three great Abrahamic faiths. Remember the hardships which many have endured for so long and which have been exacerbated by the pandemic and pray for them. Please give thanks to God for the way in which visiting the Holy Land can help people’s faith to grow and bring new understandings.
If you can, please also consider giving to the Bishop’s Lent Call so that we can help to make sure that the feeding project in Jerusalem and the other feeding programmes that we have featured can be supported and bring practical help to those in need. We know that some will be unable to give but if you can please give thanks to God for his generosity to us and give in response to that.
Here is a prayer for use with our Lent Call materials.
Creator God,
we give thanks for all that you have given to us.
We pray for those who are experiencing food insecurity
in the places featured in the Lent Call and elsewhere.
Help us to show compassion for them.
Give us the will to work with others to help to bring about change.
Help us to show our care and concern for those around us who are in need.
Bring justice and fullness of life to all your people.
We ask this through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord.
Amen.
For more information about the ways you can donate to the Bishop’s Lent Call please visit the How To Give section of our Lent Call pages.
