This Feature Article is provided as a
service of the Mission Volunteers Program Area of the
General Board of Global Ministries
The United Methodist Church
You may copy and distribute this
article to interested persons.
United Methodist Volunteers in Mission
Bethlehem 2000 / Palestine-Israel Mission Team
Bethlehem 2000
This year and the next, great numbers of Christians from around the world
will be making a unique pilgrimage to the birthplace of Jesus Christ in order to be part
of a momentous celebration: the two thousandth anniversary of the birth of Jesus
Christ. At the center of preparations for that celebration will be the Palestinian
Christian community, working in cooperation with their government, the Palestinian
Authority.
Already, in Manger Square and the surrounding streets,
where thousands of pilgrims, in hundreds of tongues will lift their voices in hymns of
praise and thanksgiving for God's immeasurable gift of Jesus the Christ, renovations and
preparations are well underway. And among all the joyful worshipers from distant
lands there will be Palestinian Christians present. Many of the
visitors (including some United Methodists) will be unaware that they may well be standing right
next to a present-day citizen of the town where Jesus was born. That visitor's neighbor
belongs to a community whose ancestors were touched by the Holy Spirit at the first
Pentecost, a community that, for 2,000 years and often in the face of persecution and
oppression by occupying powers, nurtured and kept the Christian faith alive in the land of
its birth.
The persecution and oppression by an occupying power
continues to this day. The Reverend Alex Awad, a Palestinian, the pastor of the East
Jerusalem Baptist Church and a member of the GBGM's Palestine-Israel
Mission Team, has described the 2000th anniversary of Christ's nativity as "a
sweet and sour celebration!" That "...little town of Bethlehem..."
notes Alex, is now ringed by Israeli settlements, land that has been owned for centuries
by Palestinians is occupied and its agricultural use destroyed so that yet another
"safe" highway through Palestinian territory can be built for the settlers and
the military, and Palestine landowners attempting to visit their stolen land are attacked
by the settlers - even since the recent Israeli general election.
These situations and others equally distressing need the attention of United
Methodists and the American people generally. The United Methodist Church has
adopted resolutions urging its members who visit Palestine and Israel to spend at least
twenty percent of their time in those lands meeting with and learning from Palestinians
and Israelis (both Jews and Arabs). The GBGM Palestine-Israel
Mission Team is ready to serve UMVIMs and other UMC visitors to the Holy Land achieve
that objective.
GBGM's Palestine-Israel
Mission Team
Volunteers In Mission are a special
kind of UMC traveler around the world. Nowhere is this more evident than among those
UMVIMs who travel to work in the Holy Land, the spiritual home of
Christians everywhere and the domestic home of the first Christians whose descendants have
lived there in an unbroken line from two thousand years.
United
Methodist Volunteers In Mission who are seeking opportunities to work
in the Holy Land on projects that are being developed by local Palestinian communities
should know of the presence there of the Palestine-Israel Mission Team of
the General Board of Global Ministries (GBGM) of the United
Methodist Church.
The Mission Team comprises five UMC
missionaries: the Reverend Alex Awad and Brenda Awad, the Reverend Sandra Olewine, and
Mary and Peter Davies. The team's office, run by Brenda, is in the Awads' home in
Beit Sahour. the e-mail address is: umcvisitors@juno.com.
The team has close connections with Palestinian community groups that would welcome
small groups of co-workers from the UMC. Among those Palestinian community groups
that have already hosted UMVIM groups or would welcome new groups are: the Bethlehem
Bible College, the Hope Secondary School in Beit Jalla, the House
of Hope (founded in Israel by a Palestinian Christian), and the elementary and
high schools founded by Fr. Elias Chacour, the author of Blood
Brothers. A new field of activity may be opened for UMVIMs if
the Palestinian Authority agrees to a plan to have overseas volunteer work groups assist
in upgrading public school infrastructures.
The Mission Team has been established
to assist United Methodist visitors to the Holy Land acquire a better understanding of
biblical events and the holy sites within the context of contemporary religious,
political, and social life in today's Palestine and Israel. This objective is
achieved by arranging for UMC visitors to meet Palestinians and Israelis (both Jews and
Arabs) and even stay as paying guests in Palestinian homes so that they may learn from
their hosts about daily life in the Holy Land with its almost constant state of tension
and insecurity.
By their work commitment and working, as they do, alongside their
Palestinian workmates, United Methodist Volunteers In Mission have
more than passing
concern for the problems besetting the people of the Holy Land. But that same work
commitment also means that the time available for UMVIMs to broaden their
contacts with people elsewhere than at their work locations is limited perhaps to four or
five days. The Mission Team is able to help UMVIMs
prepare for their visits and arrange their itineraries so that they may use that time as
effectively as possible.
For information on UMVIM
opportunities:
please go to the Where
We Go section in this website
or
contact your UMVIM Jurisdictional or Annual Conference Coordinator
(their contact information can be found in the Resources
section)
or
contact the Mission Volunteers Program Area
General Board of Global Ministries, UMC
475 Riverside Drive, Room 330
New York, NY 10115
Tel 800 / 554-8583 or 212 / 870-3825
Email: voluntrs@gbgm-umc.org
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