|
Friends United Meeting |
 |
March/April 2006
Finding Hope with Father Chacour
By Margaret Hawthorn
With a longing eye cast to a strip of land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, late 19th century British Zionist Israel Zangwill coined the phrase: “A land without a people for a people without a land.” As Father Chacour, a Melkite Priest called by many Abuna (Father), points out, there was a glitch. A tiny country under British Mandate, Palestine already had a people—roughly 1,308,000 Palestinians*—by the time the declaration of the State of Israel came into effect in 1948.
As a curious, energetic seven-year-old, Elias Chacour kept track of his cozy world from a perch in the fig tree his father had planted beside their ancient home in northern Galilee. Unaware of the impact a war in a part of the world beyond Galilee would have on them, his family went about their daily lives in much the same manner their ancestors had for hundreds of years.
When word reached their village of Biram that Zionist soldiers were coming, Chacour’s father remained calm. At the core of his Christian faith lay an unquenchable thirst for peace based on forgiveness and hospitality. He explained to his family that in a land far away their Jewish brothers and sisters had been badly hurt, and they needed a new place to call home.
Within the elder Chacour’s memory, Christians, Jews and Muslims had lived in Galilee as peaceful neighbors. The family prepared to welcome a people fleeing from horrors that had taken place in Europe. In the face of the enormous losses his family and people would sustain through the years, Elias’ father steadfastly refused to succumb to hatred.
Abuna entered the room briskly, bantered with the group for a moment, then asked, “When did you get here? What have you seen?”
One person told him, “On our first day, we were detained for over an hour at a checkpoint in Hebron.”
“Excellent for you!” he exclaimed. A few days earlier, a student at the Palestinian University of Birzeit, near Ramallah, had held two thumbs in the air when we told her about the detention. Both Abuna and the student embraced as an expression of solidarity our minor brush with something Palestinians experience routinely.
“What questions do you have for me?”
I wanted to know many things, but couldn’t frame a question. By now we’d spent over a week hearing overwhelming stories of human rights abuses. Only later would I realize what I most wanted to know: Where did Abuna find hope?
We had met with delegates from religious and secular groups. We had listened to Palestinian Christians and Muslims, Israelis active in efforts to promote peace and human rights, the UN Office for the Committee on Humanitarian Affairs, a representative from Wi’am (a Palestinian conflict resolution center) and others. Comments from a number of these people made us aware of the vital role played by the voice of reconciliation from Palestine’s dwindling Christian population.
“We don’t have in our lexicon words for revenge, hatred and bombing,” Abuna said. “You see, our problem is a man called Jesus Christ. We are always reminded of what he says to us: ‘love your neighbor.’ That’s why we often find ourselves between two extremes—extremist Muslims and extremist Zionists.”
The Christianity articulated by Father Chacour and others we met is no less radical. When neighborly love is the centerpiece of faith, forgiveness becomes a way of life. Over and over, forgiveness and reconciliation emerged at the core of religious practice among Christians in Palestine. To forgive seven times seventy is not hyperbole, but is lived as gospel. In its own way, substituting reconciliation for revenge and oppression as the path to peace is as extreme and risky an approach as resorting to violence. But if we take the Beatitudes seriously, it is our source of hope.
Father Chacour offered disturbing statistics. Only 137,000 Palestinian Christians remain in Palestine/Israel, representing 25% of Palestinian Christians worldwide. The rest live in the larger diaspora outside the country. Approximately 1,200 such families are in Toronto, Canada, with another 800 in Melbourne, Australia. A few years ago, 60% of those remaining in Palestine said they would leave immediately, given the chance.
While in his 40s, Father Chacour attempted to become part of the Palestinian diaspora. Exhausted and discouraged, he tried to convince himself he could best help his people by traveling and living abroad, educating the world about the Palestinian story. He could accomplish as much, or maybe more, than he would as a priest in an obscure town tucked into the hills of Galilee.
He moved to Germany to consider a university teaching post when news of the massacre of hundreds of men, women, children and elderly in two refugee camps in Lebanon reached him. Shortly before his mother died she had said, “Be strong, Elias. What you do matters. Especially for the young ones.” He returned to the church he had left in the town of Ibillin, where he has been an outspoken voice for peace and reconciliation in the 25 years since.
“Do you know,” he asked, “Muslims are not born Muslims? That Jews are not born Jews? I was not born a Christian.” He smiled over this riddle.
“I was born a baby! If my Christianity has any meaning, it is to bring me back to the original beauty of being a child of God.”
His love for children shone on his face. “Palestinians have been deprived of all kinds of human rights, with one exception— the right to make children. We have many beautiful children who look around at houses and land and say, ‘That was my family’s field, there was my grandfather’s house.’” As he spoke, I pictured the children we met at the Ramallah Friends Schools, and especially the little ones with dark, sparkling eyes at the Amari Refugee Camp Play Center.
The Beatitudes, first preached on a hill not far from his home village, were a source of comfort to Elias when his mother recited them to him as a small boy. Later he wrestled with them until he was able to put them in context with what had taken place in his homeland. Perhaps hope could be found in bringing their promise to the children of Palestine.
In Ibillin he organized a camp for children from the surrounding area. He planned it for 500 children, but over 1,100 signed up. Eliminating extra expenses from an already tight budget, he arranged for campers to sleep in olive groves. As they lay under the stars he told them, “Some of these trees are 2,000 years old. Respect these trees. Your forefathers planted them. Your roots are as old as these trees.”
Recognizing the importance of education, he collected books to open the first village library in Palestine. He started a peace center and an elementary school which grew into a high school. Recently, it extended to university level. Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Druze students—4500 from 70 towns and villages—learn together in a setting dedicated to peacebuilding.
Abuna urged us to go home and tell what we had learned, to help the world become aware of the Palestinians’ plight. “My only yearning is to send you back to the U.S., and to sit instead with Jews so they will listen.” But, he cautioned, we must remain pro peace and not anti any group. “If taking the side of Palestinians means accepting violence on the part of anyone, you are not my friend. You hurt my people.”
He paused to take a phone call, giving us time to reflect. We knew of the harassment and humiliation Palestinians are often subjected to at checkpoints. I seethed when I heard these stories. While we were in Ramallah a young Palestinian had broken through security to get close enough to a soldier to slash his throat. I had responded with sadness, but it was tinged with an element of “what do you expect?”
Chastised, I wondered how true is my Quaker peace witness? My pacifism is seldom tested at this level. I’d only been in the country a week, and was ready to excuse extreme violence. Grief flooded me for the mother of the 20-year-old soldier who had died, and for the mother of the young man who, with little hope in his life before taking such radical action, now had less as he sat in an Israeli jail.
Abuna finished his phone conversation. He ended his visit with us soon after. He had generously carved time from a busy schedule, and was ready to turn to other pressing matters. We left, taking with us the firm reminder from a gentle priest in Galilee to allow Jesus to be a problem in our lives.
*http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story559.html
Margaret Hawthorn is a member of Monadnock Friends Meeting in Jaffrey, New Hampshire, and the 2004 recipient of Earlham School of Religion’s Tom Mullen fellowship for ministry in writing.
Blood Brothers by Father Elias Chacour is available at the Quaker Hill Bookstore.