For a full second, it seems that only two panes of glass seperate me from the Israeli soldier.
We look each other in the eyes, but there's no time for facial expressions to change, as our two buses pull closer to each other, as if drawn inexorably, as if pulled by gravity.
Both drivers lay on their horns, but it's the Israeli bus--bigger, louder, more expensive--that wins the day. Our little bus, full of Palestinians, slams on the brakes as the other bus, headed for a settlement, pulls around us.
And so it goes.
And I wonder--what is the story of that soldier? What is he thinking? Does he want to be wearing his uniform and carrying his gun? Is he merely fulfilling his service requirement? What is his name? Where is he from?
Who are we, inside this microcosm of conflict?
A different day, and the bus has stopped. The Israeli soldier who gets on is young. Younger than me. His automatic rifle doesn't quite fit between the seats, so he turns sideways as he checks the passports. I hold up mine--conspicuously dark blue in a sea of green Jerusalem IDs. And the teenager sitting next to me watches me out of the corners of his eyes. He knows, as I do, that there is more than a color difference between our IDs. Mine makes me Different. Here, I am in a position of power. Here, a soldier might ask me "Where are you from?"--perhaps to double check my passport, perhaps because he is from not so far away from me, originally. But I won't be made to stand on the sidewalk for hours. I won't be turned back. I wil go on my way, for now.
Glenn Rowley, during training, said: "When I am in a position of power, I try to practice the theology of the cross. When I am in a postion of powerlessness, I try to practice the theology of the empty tomb."
It is Yom Kippur, and the streets of West Jerusalem are empty. My friend Paul and I walk for miles--from New Gate to the Central Bus Station, to the Independence Park and Knesset. Empty. No cars, except for the occassional police car or ambulance. A plain clothes Israeli cop, armed and ready, leaps out of his car...to assist a small child who has fallen off of her bike. It is a beautifully human moment. I wish he didn't have a gun. I wish none of us had guns. It is like a movie set, or a scene from a Western. You can hear trash blowing on the street, it's that quiet. A few kids play frisbee in the street, or ride their bikes in the middle of the highway. No cars. Few people. Surreal. And beautiful. And I wish it wasn't trash that you could hear, wisping down the empty highways in the wind.
It is the day before the UN Day of Peace. And we can't hold the service tomorrow, because all the roads will be closed for Yom Kippur. So we pray and sing, in Arabic, and English, and Armenian, and French, and German. And Lina, from work, reads part of the liturgy. And the nuns who run the guesthouse--we are in their church, just downstairs from where I sleep--are there, and Mark Holman, the Lutheran pastor from the English-speaking congregation I attend, and so many others. And we pray and we sing, and it is hard, because we know that here, it will take a miracle for there to be peace. It will take God.
I am on a bus, to Bethlehem, to visit my two Swedish friends, Hanna and Hannah, and our friend Faith. And I just happen to be wearing my Washington College shirt. "I graduated from Washington," says Jill Granberg, who, it turns out, I've communicated with by email when we were publishing a short article from her in the International Studies Review. She is in the CPT, in At-Tuwani (www.cpt.org, if you're interested). I promise I will visit her soon. This is what it is like, in the international community here, this synchronicity, these strange connections. Will I come back here, armed with an acronym, with weapons of the spirit and of too many letters? CPT? EAPPI? TIPIH? "Getting in the way." Sabeel is Arabic for the Way. And for a stream or channel of water. Giving life. And I've said that before, but I want to repeat it. Not the organization, although that is wonderful, too. But the word. Sabeel. The Way. Spring. Channel. Water. Life.
My friend Liz writes that a world of peace will be "A world in which the tears of the lonely are felt on the cheeks of the joyful." The kingdom of God. Jesus preaches by healing. And there is so much to heal. The demons facing us are Legion. The name of the Roman army. The occupying force.
People. People with stories. Behind the history, and the security, and the fear, and the anger, and the hate, and the prejudice, and the occupation--I want to witness. I want to be a faithful witness in this land of so many narratives, clawing at each other. There is a project in schools here, where a history book is written in three columns. The one column is the Israeli narrative, the other is the Palestinian. The middle is blank, for students to write their own story--the hopeful way of thinking about it. But some days, it feels like the purpose of the middle column is to keep the other two columns apart, to be a buffer, because even the words would rip each other to pieces if they had the chance.
And where is God in all of this? There is Good News, even here!!!! Because I see this question written on the faces of the people I work with. They don't always have an answer. Sometimes, in our staff meetings, we sigh, and cover our faces, and shake our heads. And Sawsan asks me, "How can I control my anger? My home was right there, and they wouldn't let me in?" And I have no answer, other than to tell her that she chose the right way, the way of the patient widow, the ministry of erosion (thank you, David Wildman). But she's not a widow. And she wanted to get home to her husband and to her kids. And Nora says, "How can we pray about something like this? It's.....{she searches for the correct word in English. Chooses one in Arabic. And then...}..crazy. It is crazy." But they ask. How? How? Where? Where is God in all of this?
Here. With us, even as we struggle. To walk in the Way. To find a stream, a channel, of water, giving life.
It is night, in Ramadan, in the Old City. And everyone is out late, taking advantage of the breaking of the fast. And there is light. And noise. And smells.
It is night, in the Orthodox Jewish neighborhood, the first night of Yom Kippur. And there is singing, and children playing. And things here are very different, but still so...human. And I do not fit in here. But they do--you can feel the community, feel the togetherness. And there is so much to be said for that.
It is night, at the Jerusalem Hotel. And I am drinking a Taybeh beer, and updating my blog, and joking with the waiter about a nearby firecracker explosion--"The war has started!!" he says to me, and I laugh. And we laugh. Because what else can you do, in a place that has seen war? What else can you do, when the Mount of Olives was bombed in 1967? What else can you do, when there are tanks ready in the Golan Heights, in case things with Syria boil over? You laugh. And you pray.
And perhaps, when the prayers in so many different languages rise to the sky; when the late night revelers go home to their beds; when the checkpoints close for the nights, when the cars stop on Yom Kippur, and you see the beauty of this; when you see an armed police officer stopping, just to help a child; when you hear the stories and see the tension and the grief and the anger; when you take a moment, and pay attention--you can feel the meeting of the tears of the lonely and the cheeks of the joyful.
Kifa halik? How are you, in Arabic.
And the answer, whether you're doing well (mabsud!) or not, can be: alhamdu lillah.
Thanks be to God. Shalom. Salaam. Peace.
