Issue 79: Catholic Perspectives on the Holy Land
During the Covid-19 pandemic, a neighborhood friend sent me a job advertisement for a position at the University of Notre Dame’s campus in Jerusalem. He knew I had a background in higher education and thought that this might be an interesting opportunity. I was of course familiar with Notre Dame - mostly because of its reputation as a football powerhouse - but had no idea that the Catholic university had a facility just a twenty minute walk from my home. After I submitted my application, I explored Notre Dame’s website in an attempt to better understand the values that underpinned not only the university’s culture but also its presence in Jerusalem. My curiosity about the Catholic relationship with the Holy Land was a motivating factor behind my decision to accept a position at Notre Dame Jerusalem. As I’ve nudged many Notre Dame students over the last three years, “I understand why Jews and Israelis care about this place. I understand why Palestinians care about this place. But can you explain to me why Catholics care about this place?”
The relationship between Catholicism and the Holy Land cannot be easily summarized. There are theological, historical, spiritual, political, and practical layers to understanding the relationship between one of the oldest Christian institutions and the terra sancta. Similar to the principle of “two Jews, three opinions”, a faith community of over one billion has a range of perspectives and beliefs influenced by geography, culture, historical narrative, and interpretation of text. You can start with a basic question, but don’t expect to always find straightforward answers.
Learning about this diversity alongside students and faculty has been one of the great rewards of working at Notre Dame Jerusalem, so I wanted to take the opportunity to share with you a project that we’ve developed over the past year: a podcast series featuring Catholic perspectives on the Holy Land and from the Holy Land.
The idea for the series was born in the middle of the war. Many of our traditional programs that included international participants and faculty had ground to a halt. To address this challenge, we decided to create content that could be easily disseminated with an audience that cares deeply about this place but under the circumstances is unable to visit. And what better way to achieve this than by establishing a platform that would enable listeners to better understand the richness and complexity that defines Catholic identity in the Holy Land.
We asked Avraham (Avrum) Burg, one of our faculty members, to interview both senior leaders of the Catholic Church in the Holy Land - known as the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem - as well as other notable academics, public figures, and community members in order to shed a bit more light on this diverse community which includes Israelis, Palestinians, Jordanians, Cypriots, as well as migrants who do not hold citizenship or belong to any of these national communities. Personally, the process of developing a cohesive podcast series was a new challenge, and one I thoroughly enjoyed. It also helped me sharpen questions that I have about:
The role of minority religious groups in the Holy Land, and what practices/policies can best allow their continuity under today’s challenging circumstances.
How to better facilitate interfaith engagement beyond the familiar, clergy-level engagements.
How the micro-level dynamics between Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Holy Land today resonates at the macro-level dialogue between these three monotheistic faiths.
Check out Season 2 of Notre Dame Jerusalem’s podcast, Jerusalem TalksND, available both on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and please send me any questions or comments you have after listening.
Best,
Gabi
Wow. Forgive me for what I already see will be a long comment.
a) As a teen - many decades ago - I came up with an idea for a novel that included a character who was a Christian from the Galilee and I became interested in the history of the various streams of Christianity Israel and the general area (Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, etc.). I tried then and at later times to research this topic using the internet and got nowhere, finding only political sites and not historical ones. I didn't know who to ask. Over the years I had opportunities to learn more about the history of Christianity in general, but not about the Christian communities of this region in particular.
So first question - can you refer me to reliable sources and resources to learn about these histories? In what context did they form, how and when did they interact with the wider world of Christianity and with one another and how did they develop through the always active general history of the region?
b) Serendipity. I am a violin teacher. The summer of 2010 I was asked to teach a young girl whose family was renting my parents' neighbor's apartment in Jerusalem over the summer. Although I didn't live in Jerusalem, I was spending more time there than usual because my father was ill. A year or so later, the family spent a year in Israel - the father was doing something at TEI and they were living at Tantur. That was the first time I discovered it was there. It was a bit nerve-wracking to drive into (and out of!) but I wound up teaching that same girl for that academic year as well. I see that UND officially opened its branch there in 2018 - way after my time visiting the place - but it was interesting to read your post, discover someone else with an interest in the history of at least one Christian group in the area, and to find out how Tantur - a beautiful place - was faring. No second question... :-)