"Normally" we meet the following abnormal phenomenon : visitors are usually more interested in the Holy Land than in its inhabitants.

So it really becomes, as the ancient Israelite spies had said, "a land that eats its inhabitants".

This Country is full of Holy Places, sites , shrines and monuments. But the popular italian wisdom says :"It is better to receive , alive, a compliment, than, dead, a momument". Let us rather speak like Saint Peter : the Christians of the Holy Land (and of the world) are the "living stones" (1 P 2:5) . In Palestine, the shrines are the "dead stones" and the Faithful the living ones.

We shall talk about the local Christians of the Holy Land.

1- Who are they?

Every Christian in the Holy Land becomes automatically a Christian of the Holy Land, as "Jerusalem is the Mother of all Churches" ("Mater omnium ecclesiarum"). Christians are all citizens of Jerusalem, since "all were born there" (cfr. Ps 87(86): 6).

The Church itself was born in Jerusalem (Jesus in Bethlehem), on the day of Pentecost, when the Apostles, moved by the Spirit of God, announced the Good News of salvation in various languages, putting an end to the confusion of the old Babel (cfr. Gn 11: 1 ff.)

But the Holy Land has itslocal Christians, part of the universal Church, whose heart is Jerusalem and whose head (for the Catholics) is Rome. The local Christians are the descendants and heirs of the primitive Church which had two branches : a Jewish-Christian community and a Pagano-Christian one.

Today's local Church is composed of Judeo-Christians and of Arabic (mostly Palestinian) Faithful. The former are a very small minority (roughly 250 Catholics, 4 to 5 thousand Protestants). Since the fall of the Soviet Union, many Christians came to the Country as "Jewish Immigrants" . Some of them were integrated in the Israeli Jewish society but others kept and still keep, more or less discretely, their Christian faith.

As for the local Arab Palestinian Church it counts, according to the last statistics, 140.000 Faithful, from Dan to Bersabea, from Galilee, Samaria, Judaea and the Gaza Strip. Most of the Christians of Galilee are Catholics (especially from the Oriental rites), whereas the majority in the other territories is constituted by the Orthodox Churches, especially the byzantine (Greek) one.

The Armenian Church counts roughly six thousand people (the majority are Orthodox). They are not considered as foreigners because, in spite of the national character of their Church, language and heritage, they easily speak the local languages (Arabic and Hebrew) and not rarely are united in marriage with local Arab people.

The local Arabic Palestinian Christians are more or less 2 to 2,5 per cent of the whole population of the Country.

2- Where do they come from?

A- Jewish Christians :

They are the heirs and descendants of the "Church of circumcision" which had started on the day of Pentecost 30 A.D. The Lord Himself, the Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph, all the Apostles and many Disciples were Jews.

The 50 A.D. first Jerusalem Council solved the problem among Judaizers and moderate Christians (cfr. Acts 15 : 1 ff.) But many Jewish-Christians insisted on living as Jews, with the ritual and external prescriptions of the mosaic Law, and preferred a ghetto-like life- which led eventually to their extinction, especially under the byzantine regime (from the 4th - seventh centuries A.D.) .

Others were exiled to the Arabian Peninsula. Some scholars (like Fr. Yussef Qazzi) think that their influence was decisive for the formation of Islam which maintained many rituals (circumcision, ablutions, clen and unclean food etc) with the faith in Jesus as Messiah, Prophet but not always acknowledged as the incarnation of the Word of God or not as really crucified (compare with respectively the arian, docete and nestorian heresies).

At any rate, Jewish-Christians, as a community, disappeared around the fourth century.

After the first Zionist Congress (in Basel, Switzerland, l897) some Christians of Jewish background began to "return"; other groups came with other Jewish Israelite (or agnostic) immigrants, especially in the thirties of this 20 th century.

Already in the last century, a Jewish convert, Fr. Alphonse-Marie Ratisbonne, founded the congregation of "Our Lady of Zion" in two branches, namely male and female.

After the foundation of Israel, more Jewish-Christians arrived.

Nowadays, as far as Catholics are concerned, the Hebrew speaking Community gravitates around centres in Jerusalem (St Peter in Gallicantu and the Dominican Convent Saint-Isaie, Agron street, Mamilla), Jaffa-Tel Aviv, Haifa and Beersheba.

Jewish-Christians are looked at as "false brothers" by Jews. The israeli society and administration try to put pressure on them so that they embrace Judaism. Otherwise they are submitted to all sorts of hardships and harrassments in such a way that they think of emigrating. The Israeli law (approved by the israeli Knesset - Parliament) forbids to proselytise with JEWS. Yet, Protestants are more courageous than Catholics in evangelizing them. Of course, risks (for the "evangelizers" and the neophytes) and negative Jewish reactions are expected to occur.

B- Arab Palestinian Christians:

Theirs is a long and continuous story or rather History. Descendants of the Jewish and/or gentile primitive Church, they used to express themselves in Aramaic, as local tongue, and Greek, as the international language of culture.

The 4 to the sixth centuries were the golden age of Christianity in its cradle, Palestine. In 614 the Persians conquer the Country and destroy most churches. They are stopped in the Nativity Church by a representation of the Magi in Persian clothes!

In 638 the muslim Arabs, originary from the Arabian Peninsula, occupy Jerusalem. The General Amr ibn Al-Aass conquers the Holy City (whose name will become in Arabic Al-Quds). But the Patriarch Sophronius insists to meet the Caliph personally :Omar ibn Al-Khattab to whom he hands over the keys of Jerusalem. Thus bloodshed is spared. The Caliph, wise and tolerant, refuses to pray in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, claiming that such a prayer would give rights to the Muslims there. He does not force Christians to become Muslims. But, sadly enough, that following Christmas , due to orders from the Arab army leaders, the population of Bethlehem does not dare to go to the Nativity Church and the Patriarch Sophronius does not celebrate Christmas in Bethlehem!

Unfortunately, other Caliphs and Governors did not share Omar's tolerance towards the "People of the Book". Anti-Christian persecutions erupted, forcing Christians either to embrace Islam or to die as martyrs or to undergo humiliations and heavy personal and collective taxes (according to Kur'an 9 : 29).

On the other hand, mixed marriages with Muslim soldiers or rulers, and defections of shallow , materialistic and ambitious "Christians" - as well as internal divisions fostered the Islamization of many persons and groups. Fear was also an important element which made weak Christians "switch" to Islam in order to stay alive and safe and sound.

The fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim bi-amril -Lah (Abbreviation : Al-Hakim) ordered , in 1009, to burn all the Christian shrines, included the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. One of his governors, Iftikhar (ad-din) waged war against poor Christian civlians. Historians evaluate the number of local Christians to 7000 in Palestine!

In 1071, "under the leadership of Sultan Alp Arslan , the Seljuk Turks crushed the byzantine army at Manzikert, in Armenia.

The last third of the eleventh century was an unusually agitated period for the Holy Land ... Moving violently westward, the Seljuks had occupied the land massacring its inhabitans right and left, profaning the Holy Places and rendering devout approach to them hazardous if not altogether impossible. The remnant of the Christian population sent forth pitiful calls for help; the tales told by pilgrims who had escaped the Turkish executioners , of the atrocious crimes perpetrated in the Holy Land, left an indescribably inflammatory impression on Western Europe...The appeal from the Holy Land was reinforced by a no less pressing sollicitation of military aid on the part of the byzantine Empire itself (according to Latin sources)...

Pope Urban II, of French origin, was among the most fervid instigators of the First Crusade"(cfr. Saul P. Colbi, Christianity in the Holy Land, Past and Present, pp. 35 - 38) , in a historical speech at Clermont-Ferrand in l085. The Crusaders came to reconquer the Holy Land, help the local Christians and the Pilgrims, keep and venerate the Holy Christian Places. They stayed in Palestine from l099 - 1291 after having failed to strengthen, through immigrants, the Christian presence.

Thus local Arab Palestinian Christians do not come from an Islamic background, as Islam condemns to death the "apostates". Historically, many Muslims are ex-Jews and/or ex-Christians.

We pass quickly to the Ottoman regime (1517 -1917) : Christians underwent various persecutions, as Arabs and as Christians. Many of them left the Country for Latin America where they arrived with Turkish passports. This is why the latinos called them "turcos, turquitos" until the present day.

The fate of the Holy Places, especially the Holy Sepulchre and the Basilica of the Nativity, knew many fluctuations and changes, due to the policy of the Ottoman Turks who used to favour the Catholics (represented mainly by the Franciscans, official guardians of the Shrines on behalf of the Catholic Church and superpowers, since 1333) and the Orthox Churches, especially the Byzantine one, under the influence of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople.

At last, on February 8 , l852, the "status quo" was decreed. Since then, nothing changed basically for the status and rights of the different rites in the above mentioned Shrines in Jerusalem, Bethlehem and the Tomb of the Virgin Mary.

The British Mandate (1917-1948) favoured local Christians culturally and socially. But the first schools and academic syllabuses had an anti-catholic approach, especially in the handbooks of History which mentioned only the negative sides of the Catholic Church History (This policy continued till now).

The Jordanian regime (1949-1967) in East Jerusalem, the West bank, as well as the Egyptian regime in the Gaza Strip, brought an Arabic Islamic cultural setup. So the handbooks of Arabic language were coranically oriented (and so they are nowadays also).

Emigration of Palestinians in general and of Christians in particular led them to Arab countries, especially Jordan, Lebanon and the Gulf states.

The Israeli occupation (l967-1994) was an additional humiliation to the Palestinian people.

Christians, a minority in the Arab minority, continued to emigrate. The Israeli society brought an occidentalised milieu which was an additional challenge to the faith and morals of the Palestinian Christians (and Muslims).

The Palestinian National Authority, in many parts of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, has a great good will but poor financial possibilities. Thus it does not support private schools.

This panoramic brief view of the History of the local Arab Church needs much more time and precision. Nevertheless it gives, hopefully, an idea about the past and explains somehow various religious and political features of this complicated and holy Country.

3- The present situation:

Christian Palestinians , generally speaking, suffer from the political situation. Whether they are Israeli citizens (in the 1948 territories), or holders of Palestinian passports in the autonomous Palestinian National Authority lands, or still under Israeli direct occupation and administration (in the various villages and small towns of Judaea and Samaria), the majority of Palestinians feel a deep frustration.

They rightly await an independent and souverain Palestinian State.

As for Palestinians under Israeli regime, they wish an equal treatment as their Jewish fellow citizens. One has also to admit that a certain number of Palestinians living "in the Green Line" think and sense that they are only ISRAELIS, and designate themselves as "Arab Israelis" rather than "Palestinians", content with the Israeli Nationality, proud of the facilities offered by an Israeli passport, social services, insurances and high wages among other privileges...

In spite of individual and small group differences, Palestinian Christians feel rejected by Israeli zionist Jews who rule out the creation of a Palestinian State on palestinian soil. They also feel rejected by fundamentalist Muslims to whose mind only the Muslims are real Arabs. Every day life yields numerous occasions for such national and religous conflicts.

At the religious level, Christians are accused, by the Jews and the Muslims, of "polytheism" or "tritheism", namely of worshipping three divinities : the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Our Christian faith is described as blasphemous as we profess that Jesus is the Son of God : a notion of corporal fatherhood and of sonship in the raltion between "the Father and the Son". Jews, especially the orthodox, follow the claims of the Talmud about Jesus being the illegitimate son of a Roman soldier, Panthera. The cross is a sign that many Jews do not admire as they see in it the symbol of the Christian "heresy" and, later, of the Nazi cruel regime.

On the other hand, Muslims claim that Jesus was never crucified. They accuse Chrsistians of adoring the cross. Other charges and prejudices , from the part of some Muslims, do not help a pacific coexistence nor a common "battle " for the liberation of Palestine, namely that Christians had falsified the Gospel (New Testament), that theirs is an impure religion, as it allows eating swine meat and drinking alcohol. But, since Muslim and Christian Palestinians talk the same language, they have learned, all over the centuries, to respect each other and to discuss, with friendliness, about various issues. Yet, there are fanatics here and there.

Mixed marriages are a serious problem for the Palestinian Christian community. In the Israeli Jewish society, because also of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, marriages between Arab Christians and Jews are not frequent and generate many complications and awkward situations. According to modern Israeli law, the children of a Jewess are considered Jews!

With Muslims, mixed marriages do not seem to be a success, neither on the religious nor on the social levels. In general, the children of a Muslim man are registered automatically as Muslims. A Muslim husband may repudiate his wife - unless the "immunity ('ismah) is in her hand". He may marry, at the same time, another three wives, he keeps the custody of his children in case of conflict (dealt with in the shari'ah islamic courts). If a Christian man wants to marry a Muslim lady, he usually has to embrace Islam.

Our christian schools carry a heavy burden in the Palestinian Territories since they do not receive any financial support from the Palestinian Ministry of Education.

4- Mission of the local Christians of the Holy Land :

a- To be , in the Country of Christ, "with mildness and respect" (cfr. 1 Peter 3 :15) the (last) Witnesses of Christ, of His Godship and Resurrection, as well as of His sublime Teachings. b- to give their experience, as a Mother Church, to the daughter Churches. c - to invite to the unity of Christians (in spite of their divisions), since Jesus, in Jerusalem, prayed for the unity of His followers (cfr. John 17). d- to honour the Holy Christian Places and surround them with a fervent Christian presence. e - to spread a message of faith and hope, as a continuation of Christ's mission. christian.htm

Conclusion:

These were some main and quick points in a very broad and complicated theme. I thank you for your attention and would like to conclude with the words of the Psalmist (122 (121) 6 ff : " Pray for peace in Jerusalem..." and, with dreamy visionary - hopefully prophetic eyes- with the idyllic description of the Mother Church in the Holy Land by Saint Luke in the Book of Acts (9 : 31): " The Church, throughout Judaea, Galilee and Samaria was now left in peace, building herself up, living in the fear of the Lord, and filled with the consolation of the Holy Spirit".