Comments (0)Christian Zionists, Christian Palestinian Advocates Eye Baltimore
Christian groups with sharply opposing views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict eye Baltimore for expansion.
January 21, 2010Neil Rubin
Editor
Two upcoming church-based events here by international operations offer a glimpse into the fissure amongst some swathes of the Christian community on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
• The Lutherville-based Trinity Assembly of God — a large evangelical congregation — will host a “dynamic educational event” to engage Christians to be “motivated as never before to pray, to support the local church and to stand with Israel.” The seminar, tomorrow, Jan. 23, from 9 a.m. to noon, is sponsored by the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ), perhaps the world’s leading Christian Zionist operation.
• A few weeks later, Mark Braverman, who is Jewish and author of the newly-published “Fatal Embrace: Christians, Jews and the Search for Peace in the Holy Land,” will speak at Baltimore’s Cathedral of the Incarnation, an Episcopal church, at the inaugural event of the Friends of Sabeel-Baltimore. The Wednesday, Feb. 10, at 7 p.m. event supports the Jerusalem-based Sabeel: Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, which is run by Palestinian Christian clergy harshly critical of Israeli government policies toward the Palestinians.
The first event is $10, while the second is free and open to the public.
This area is a logical venue for both groups, according to Dr. Adam Gregerman, Jewish scholar at the Baltimore-based Institute for Christian and Jewish Studies.
“I’m not surprised that there’s an interest in Baltimore because there’s a healthy tradition of religious activism here,” he said. “These are groups that have reached out to Jews and Christians on either side of the spectrum. They obviously bring opposing perspectives, but in a way Baltimore has had a mainstream moderating approach.”
He added, “On either side of the spectrum both of these groups are challenged by large portions of either community. Sabeel is problematic because they have used anti-Jewish imagery; ICEJ makes some Jews nervous because of evangelical orientation, even if they foreswear proselytism.”
ICEJ, according to its Web site, is “at the forefront of a growing mainstream movement of Christians worldwide who share a love and concern for Israel and an understanding of the biblical significance of the modern ingathering of the Jews to the land of their forefathers.”
Sabeel, according to its Web site, seeks to promote how “by learning from Jesus — his life under occupation and his response to injustice” ways to “connect the true meaning of Christian faith with the daily lives of all those who suffer under occupation, violence, discrimination, and human rights violations.”
The ICEJ event, held on Shabbat, is not intended for Jews, noted ICJE U.S. director Susan Michael.
“We’re very careful in trying not to offend anyone and I don’t want people to think we’re promoting this to the Jewish community,” she said.
The goal, she added, is for Christians to know that the ICEJ is their voice in Jerusalem, can bring them information to disseminate and can encourage them “to be directed in their prayers” on behalf of the State of Israel.
“We tell Christians, ‘You can’t understand [the Israeli-Arab conflict] if you did not grow up in a Jewish home where you talked about Israel and current affairs all the time,’” she said. “It’s our job to educate them about the complexity of the issues and what’s going on now.”
For his part, Paul Verduin, Maryland coordinator for Friends of Sabeel-North America, stressed, “We’re not aligned with what people might consider the Israeli side or the Jewish side or the Palestinian side or the Muslim side or the Christian side. We’re strong believers in a just peace and reconciliation between all the peoples in the land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea.”
Mr. Braverman was more blunt. Noting his love for Israel, past trips there and concern for his many Israeli relatives, he described a 2006 West Bank tour that highlighted the plight of Palestinians.
“Many Christians and Jews don’t see that,” he said. “They go to the holy sites and it’s very sanitized. When you see the Palestinians, it’s very, very shocking.”
He was, he said, far more outraged than most Christians on the trip.
“What we’re doing to the Palestinians counts as genocide,” he said. “You don’t have to have the ovens, you don’t have to have the trains. It’s everything the Germans did in terms of marginalization and getting them out of town. It’s urgent and I don’t think the Jewish people are ready to see that.”
His message for Christians: “The interfaith conversations that have happened for the most part are wonderful, but there’s a real dark side, too. If you are a Christian you almost have been taught not to bring up Israel because Jews are very, very sensitive to it and you don’t want to be accused of being anti-Semitic… I get up and say, ‘I know you’re not anti-Semitic when you challenge Israel on human rights and settlements and I know it’s a dilemma you have because of what your brother-in-law or your pastor is telling you, but I’m telling you as a Jew you have to call us on this.”
Bringing that as well as the ICEJ perspective here could be of great interest to the interfaith community, Dr. Gregerman explained.
“I’d hope that Baltimore’s tradition of interfaith dialogue,” he said, “would make it possible for these groups to learn about the reservations some have about them.”
Future Moves
Sabeel’s Baltimore chapter hopes to follow their Feb. 10 program with another event six to eight weeks later, according to Paul Verduin, Maryland coordinator for Friends of Sabeel-North America.
He hopes to bring here either Anna Baltzer, author of “Witness In Palestine: A Jewish American Woman in the Occupied Territories,” or the actor and playwrite Najla Said, daughter of the late Arab-American activist Edward Said.
The International Christian Embassy Jerusalem wants to run additional seminars in the area by year’s end, according to Susan Michael, the group’s U.S. director. One likely candidate is a program focusing on the history of Christian anti-Semitism. Others include “The Bible’s answers to today’s questions” and “Islam and America.”
That last program, Ms. Michaels said, “will educate them more on the Islamic faith and its growing influence in American and help the church respond to that.”
— Neil Rubin