Outside the Church of All Nations in (or by what has now been shrunk into) the Garden of Gethsemane,there is a sign declaring ‘No explanations inside the church.’ Despite the sermon value in the notice, we are at a point in our journey through the Holy Land when we are crying out for an explanation from the church.
We began the day on top of the Mount of Olives, gazing across to the famous and much photographed panorama of the city, with the Dome of the Rock at the centre, shadowed by the Holy Sepulchre. Here on the mount, Jesus taught the disciples the Lord’s Prayer: Andre reading it to us in Aramaic and Hebrew, Frank reading it in Swahili and Dibeli, Andrew in Gujarati, Linda E in Mandarin, Kevin in Welsh. Here, Jesus wept over the city, where the many pilgrims around the world squeeze into Dominus Flevit, worshipping and photographing as they go. Here, at the foot of the mount, Jesus wrestled with his fear and terror and resolved not to escape back up the mount and down the other side, across the Judean desert. Instead, here he embraced betrayal and gave himself up to the occupying forces and religious leaders who had dreaded that his message and following were too disturbing a force to be reckoned with.
Back in the old city, via St Stephen’s/Lion Gate, we walked the traditional Stations of the Cross, stopping only for lunch at a place of Jerusalem that is forever Austria. From the roof of the Austrian Hospice, we looked again over the densely populated city (50,000 people packed into 1 square km). Resuming the Via Dolorosa, we ended up at the Holy Sepulchre, with a bit of shopping en route.
I found today to be restorative after all we had experienced on our journey to date. The journey from Bethlehem to Jerusalem had been the most painful part of our trip for me, because it had changed almost beyond recognition. The Wall. The settlement. The checkpoint. The land covered not with grass and rugged beauty, but with overspill housing from Jerusalem. The injustice of a people oppressed, restricted, constrained. I wept too. This is not how I want to picture the Holy Land.
Why is it that humans at their worst can make ugly the things that once were beautiful in their own right? The people. The land. Why is it that churches at their worst can make beautiful the things that are ugly? The cross. The crucifixion. The agony. The betrayal. Why is it that we at our worst cannot make the connection between our reverencing of moments in the story of our faith, with the honouring of human life all around us, where Christ’s final journey has no such difficulty?
Even so, I fell in love with the city once again, much as I have wanted not to at times. Perhaps we all did. And it was amusing to have the Moderator of the Yorkshire Synod forbidden to pray (once we had recovered from the shock), by an orthodox priest. And it was ironic to find ourselves incensed incessantly as we traipsed through the Holy Sepulchre. And it was inspiring to be amongst crowds of pilgrims from all around the world. And it was great for me to honour my namesake, St Helena, by visiting the chapel where she is said to have discovered the Holy Cross and to revisit her cistern on the roof of the Holy Sepulchre.
Helen Garton
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