Via Dolorosa, Thursday September 13, 2018

We’re getting an early start this morning after breakfast; I had two hard-cooked eggs, fresh tomatoes, orange juice, delicious coffee and homemade sesame rolls with the most incredible Israeli honey, which is presented on the serving table in its honeycomb.  It is truly amazing!  

Our first destination was Mary’s birthplace. She was born in Jerusalem just outside the walls of the city, the daughter of (Saint) Anne and Joachim. 

Gardens abound

A priest of the White Fathers of Africa greeted us at the door to Saint Anne’s 

Above:  A lovely statue depicting Saint Anne and Mary, about age 5

Above all the grandmothers in our group posed for a photo with the White Father and the statue of Saint Anne and Mary. What an honor!

Above a remnant of one of the ancient walls that is believed to be the location of Mary’s birth and childhood

The Church of Saint Anne was built over the location of Mary’s birth in Jerusalem near the Bethesda Pools, where it has been reported throughout the ages that the sick have come and been washed and made well. 

From Mary’s birthplace and the Church of Saint Anne we made our way into the walled part of the city to begin the Way of the Cross. Father Chris led us in observing the 14 Stations of the Cross - the Via Dolorosa to Golgatha.  We wended our way through the narrow cobblestone streets towards the Church of the Holy Sepulchre that is the location of the crucifixion at Golgatha.

Below:  Groups of four each took a turn carrying the cross for a bit of the Via Dolorosa 

Father Chris accompanied us along the route. 

Above:  The 5th Station

Below:  The entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulcre has a moving mural of Jesus’ body being taken down from the cross and prepared for burial. 

 People from all over the world kneel and pray as they touch the stone. 

Of course each of us touched that stone. The hill of Calvary with the 3 crosses was located next to a quarry. And at that location the owner of the quarry, Joseph of Arimathea, had received permission from Pontius Pilate to take Jesus’ body down and bury it in a rock-hewn tomb he owned that had not been used before. 

We’d actually visited the tomb yesterday as a part of a Franciscan procession from the entrance of the church to the tomb. The fathers    chanted as a multitude of pilgrims watched us proceed that very short distance. We passed the location where Mary watched her Son suffer and die on the cross. 

Above:  A very hot and tired MP standing next to that sorrowful site. 

Jerusalem: Mount Zion

After another hardy breakfast we boarded our bus with our guide, Maher, and our driver, Rafi, and drove to Mount Zion. 

The designation Mount Zion has been the  name of three different locations in Jerusalem. The current location that is considered "Mt. Zion" is ancient Jerusalem’s Western Hill , which is just outside the walls of the Old City. More generally, all of Israel is sometimes referred to as Mount Zion. 

Below is the Zion Gate into the Old City:

Above is a vender outside the Franciscan-run Upper Room on Mt. Zion, where there is a replica of the room Jesus instructed his disciples to rent for them to celebrate the Passover Seder. 

Below is a statue of St. Francis located on the building that houses the Upper Room replica and the Upper Room Church where Father Chris said Mass today. Interestingly, the Franciscans have been protectors of the Holy Land for over 800 years. 

Above is the table where Jesus and the Twelve Apostles celebrated Passover. There was a Tree of Life on it. 

[The Upper Room was also the place where Jesus appeared to the apostles after His resurrection and where Doubting Thomas had to touch Jesus’ wounds to believe it was really He.]

After 300 years of Ottoman Empire rule of the Holy Land, the Ottomans were in need of money at the end of the 19th century and European money started coming in to help the Franciscans, so there is still a German influence on the architecture. See the bell tower of the Upper Room Church below:

It’s shaped like a German military helmet. 

Of course at the time of the two World Wars, the Germans were not supporting anything in the Holy Land, but after the end of the Second World War, they, and other European countries again began bringing money to the Franciscans here. 

Next we visited the Benedictine Abbey of the Dormitrion with its Hagia Maria Sion.  Scholars don’t know for sure what actually became of the Blessed Virgin Mary after Jesus’ resurrection. Many have been convinced that Mary fell into a deep sleep in Jerusalem and ascended bodily into Heaven. In the Hagia Sion there is a tribute to Mary, depicted as being asleep before her Ascención into Heaven. 

Also located in this Benedictine Monastery is King David’s Tomb, although it’s not actually considered to be the exact location. Throughout the ages, there have been many wars and battles; many historical landmarks have been mistakenly and meaninglessly relocated. What we saw may, or may not, be the actual tomb.  To the left in the photo below is an elderly Jewish lady who was rocking back and forth as she chanted prayers. The Abbey has been the first Christian meeting place, a Mosque and a Synagogue. 

Also on Mount Zion is the Church of Saint Peter in Gallicantu (meaning cock’s crow). 

This commemorates Peter’s 3 denials of Jesus after Jesus is arrested.  Below is the cock, the woman and the Roman soldier who’s come to arrest Him. [Luke22:57].  "But he denied him, saying "Woman,I know Him not."

Below is the actual path the Roman soldiers led Jesus away, bound and scourged.

Below a plaque depicting the soldiers pulling Jesus along the path on their way to the high priest Caiaphas’ palace where He could be tried in a religious trial. We visited the Monastery next to the church. 

"I know him not"

After they had arrived at the high priest’s house, Peter arrived there and, as Jesus had predicted, Peter denied Him three times before the cock crowed twice. 

As they found The King of the Jews guilty in the religious trial Caiaphas wanted to make sure Jesus would not be harmed by other inmates, so he kept the prisoner in his own house, rather than a prison. He had the soldiers tie a rope around Jesus’ shoulders and they lowered him into a cistern (above) in the house:  hot, humid, mosquitos, insects, DARK. It was a dungeon in every sense of the word. 

I’m only part way finished with this post, but will finish up today’s adventures later - in order to go to bed for an early wake-up tomorrow morning. Leaving at 7:30 we’ll walk the "Via Delarosa," the 14 stations of the cross and more. Stay tuned . . .

Jerusalem: Old City

Tues DAY 8: JERUSALEM: OLD CITY

We left our hotel, Norte Dame (Our Lady) after breakfast for the short drive to the Mount of Olives outside and to the east of the Old City of Jerusalem, named in honor of the olive groves that used to flourish all over these hills. The Mount has been used as a Jewish burial ground continuously for 3,000 years. 

The Mount of Olives is the location of several key events in the life of Jesus, as related in the Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles and is the place where the resurrected Jesus is believed to have ascended into Heaven. There are olive trees that date back to biblical times, as olive trees are considered eternal. They can be cut down, even burned to the ground and they will grow again, so they have been able to carbon date the trees here to thousands of years old!

We walked down to the Old City from the Mount of Olives by the Palm Sunday walkway, on which Jesus walked and rode a burro on Palm Sunday when he entered Jerusalem, knowing that he would be fulfilling the prophecies by being arrested and crucified. The walkway is cobblestones, steep, slippery, winding down the mountain but the experience of walking where Jesus walked is very moving. Towards the base of Mount Olive is the Garden of Gethsemane, famous as the place where Jesus prayed and his disciples slept the night before his crucifixión. 

The Gethsemane Basilica of Agony stands at the spot where Jesus wept and is used by Christians from all over the world. The rock on which he wept is in front of the altar. Our group was invited to sit around the altar and touch that rock while Father Chris said Mass. He asked me to read a passage from the Old Testament during the service and it was quite an honor for me. After Mass we continued our walk (very very hot at midday with little shade) to one of the entrances through the wall to the Old City, called the Dung Gate (also called the Moroccan Gate or the Silwan Gate) at the southeast corner of the Old City. It is the entrance closest to the Western Wall where Jews, Christians and Muslims go to pray and place petitions in the cracks in the Wall. 

The Western Wall (or Wailing Wall, Buraq Wall or Kotex, depending on your religion) is a relatively small section of the much longer ancient limestone retaining wall that ‘protects’ the Old City from invaders. For Muslims it is where the Prophet Mohammed tied his steed, al Buraq, and then ascended into Heaven. Due to Temple Mount entry restrictions, the Western Wall is the closest place the Jews can pray by Mount Olive and is in front of the holiest site in the Jewish faith. For Muslims the Dome of the Rock stands behind the Western Wall. 

Men and women have been separated to pray at the Wall since the end of the Six Day War in 1967. Archival photos of the Wall show men and women praying together until that time.  Men must have their head covered; hence many of the men in our group wore yarmulkes to take their prayers and petitions to the Wall. I stood between two Muslim women to say my prayers for all my loved ones at home. 

Upon completion of one’s prayers and petitions at the Wall it is considered respectful to leave the Wall by backing away from it, walking backward, never turning one’s back to the Wall. I honored that custom of the Jews and Muslims; however I did peek over my shoulder to avoid tripping on the uneven cobblestones!

After very spiritually inspiring hours today we returned to our hotel for a wonderful Mediterranean lunch - lots of vegetables and fruits, lamb and chicken and lots of desserts. Now we have the afternoon free and I’m writing. This week is Rosh Hashanah so all the Jewish stores are closed. I’m anxious to peruse a bookstore but will wait until tomorrow.  

Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Casa Nova, etc.

After another great night’s sleep at our Jerusalem hotel, the Pontifical Institute of Norte Dame of Jerusalem Center (actually owned by the Vatican), we enjoyed a hardy breakfast and headed out to Shepherds’ Field, beyond the border gate to the West Bank. What a difference between the Left Bank and Jerusalem center. The West Bank is really like a prison, where the Palestinians have to go through a very strict check point to leave that section that is completely walled in. Jews, Muslims and Christians have lived on these lands for thousands of years and the religious wars are horrendous. When the British decided to give Israel to the Jews at the end of World War II, Britain, the USA and other powers supported Israel in making and protecting the Jewish State. The Muslims automatically became foreigners in their own land. 

More on this later. Back to today’s adventures. 

Shepherds’Field is where they were keeping their sheep when the Angel of the Lord told them that a new king was born in Bethlehem, which is probably about 2 miles away!

Father Chris celebrated Mass inside the cave where an altar has been erected. It was hot and humid inside but still really inspiring, especially when we sang Christmas hymns like “Hank the Herald Angels Sing” and “Silent Night” 

Then we traveled the short distance into Bethlehem that is a tangle of really steep, narrow, windy streets, where we visited the Church of the Nativity, which is built over the actual cave where Jesus was born. It was really a mob scene; there were literally thousands of people from all over the world there. What an experience it was. 

The church dates from the 4th century. Three religions ‘share’ the premises over the birth site: the Greek Orthodox is the largest and is currently undergoing a major reconstruction and the

Armenian Orthodox, which is considerably smaller. Both are Eastern Rites that started when they disagreed with the Pope and left the Catholic Church. The third church is the Catholic Church, of which I’m a member. We stood in line to be able to visit each church and it was definitely worth the wait. 

We took a break after a jam-packed morning and had lunch at Casa Nova, the Franciscan House for pilgrims where we had al dente pasta with fresh tomato sauce and Parmesan, a salad, freshly baked pita bread, which I’ve totally fallen in love with!, roast pork, roasted potatoes, baby carrots and a fresh banana for dessert- What a fine GE tended family!

The Franciscan monks and nuns are easily identified in the distinctive form of brown cassock with a rope belt and giant wooden rosary beads dangling from their waists. Lunch was a relaxed time. 

Then, we returned to the Church of the Nativity and waited in a long line so we could get up and to see the altars and then go down into the cave to see the actual spot where Jesus was born. Also in that cave area was the tomb of Saint Jerome, the 4th century Dalmatian priest, who spent 30 years translating the the Bible from Greek and Hebrew into Latin. 

The entire experience at the Churches of the Nativity was beyond my wildest expectations. 

After all that we headed to a beautiful gift shop several blocks away, where we all did some “retail therapy!”