Holy Sepulcher Part Two

I'm sorry to say that the following pictures are in no particular order. And, unfortunately, they are not very good because the flash on my camera was being difficult and the church was so dark that even when it did work, it wasn't amazing. I'm sure that there are better pictures of this online. I would go searching myself but then I would never actually post.

So here, first are two not very good pictures of the tomb, as it has been covered over. There was a long line to go in to the tomb and see where his body lay, but neither of us, for whatever reason, got in line. All the more reason to go back, just to make sure its empty.

The outside is this sort of wood structure on the front of which are many many candles and little icons. The floor is very uneven, and, I would say, dirty. The walls are black with insense and a thousand and more years of pilgrims.

I am sorry that the pictures are out of focus. You can't really see How covered over the outside is. Very ornamented. At this point, after seeing the stone slab, and now the tomb, I went into a solidly depressed daze. After the light soaring immensity of the temple, the holy holy worship of the conference, the carnival like impact of the Mount of Olives, to come into the place where Jesus died, was buried and then rose and to find that it looked like This, well. I lost my faith in the Church. As Matt said, going out, its like the church got together and deliberately did what Jesus commanded them not to do in his High Priestly Prayer. Which, of course, is the point. We, the church have been doing what Jesus said not to do for all these years. Its so interesting to me that the church all over the world is light, filled, growing, and this church is so dark. I was discouraged that we couldn't do something nicer with this place, and then I despaired over all of humanity. Jesus gave all himself, did the must humbling thing imaginable, and this was the human response.

Here is the Rock of Golgatha. Under the Rock is a little chapel and altar. You walk up stairs to see where the cross stood.

And here is a section of the rock covered over in glass as you walk along a corridor from all the individual chapels to the stone slab.

Much of the art all over the whole building is beautiful and decaying. This was painted on the wall up in an archway leading in to see where the cross stood.

Here is the altar over the place of the cross. There is a gold (it looked liked gold) encrusted statue of Jesus looming over the altar, flanked by gold encrusted Marys. There is an unnerving statue of Mary in a glass case with a sword sticking out of her chest next to the altar. And then, all over are thousands of candles and gold of every kind. My protestant soul came up into my throat at this vision.

Looking out the window, away from Golgatha, towards the city.

Here is where the cross stood. You walk by, kneel under the altar, and put your hand into the hole.

Leaving the church, we saw a bishop.

These were propped up at the entrance to the church, probably for processions. A fitting parting image.


I, obviously, have more pictures. So eventually, perhaps, there will be a Part Three. In the meantime I am going to hustle my children into bed. Tomorrow is a big day. Everybody, of course, wants to know about the trip, 'How was it!?' being the operative question. How, in a sentence or a word, or even a look can I communicate any of this. As for the past week, forefront in my mind is the Incomparable Mercy of God in taking on the humiliation, not just of the cross, but of the Incarnation itself. That God would choose to create, would choose to reveal himself, would choose to come down here, to be rejected, despised, all for what? Me. He would have done it even if I was the only one. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. I cannot attain to it.

Holy Sepulcher Part One

Thursday Matt, Baby and I went to visit the Holy Sepulcher. We had wanted to go the day before with the whole group, but in many ways it was probably better that we went quietly by our selves, even not knowing everything that we saw. It definitely bears going back to with a guide. Many of you will have noticed a blogging silence from me after Thursday. I made some unhelpful excuse whatever day I got back to my computer, but the truth is that I was profoundly undone after seeing this place. Matt will attest that I came unglued that night, on Friday, again on Saturday and that I left the Holy Land on Monday forlorn, despairing, overwrought, shaken. What other adjectives can I discover in the back of my head. I am still trying to discover what it was that undid me at that moment, in that place. I know enough to write a little here, but hopefully as the days and months go by I can discover more.

Here is the outside of the church. You come upon it suddenly through some souvenir street shops. I had added to the stress of the visit by insisting to myself that we had to do All our shopping of presents on our way out. For those of you who don't know, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher is believed to be the place of Golgotha, or Calvary, the place where Jesus was crucified, and also the tomb, the place where he was buried. Many protestants rather believe that the Garden Tomb (never open when we happened to be walking by) is really the place Jesus was buried. From all I've heard, the Garden Tomb is a lovely place to go and you get a better sense of mission, the love of Jesus (etc. etc.) but historically, there is plenty of evidence that the Holy Sepulcher is where it all took place.

Here is the view looking up, right upon walking into the church. The church itself is large, dark, cavernous, rambling with no central lace of worshiping or saying mass. It is shared by Orthodox, Catholic, Armenians, Greek, Russian (I need to look this up). Every group has their own little altar.

If you look straight ahead instead of up, you see this beautiful fresco/mosaic (not sure, no guide book) of which I had a terrible time getting a good picture. There are probably nice one's online. It shows Jesus dying, being anointed, and then carried to the tomb.

As you walk in there is immediately a stone slab upon which pilgrims may lay anything they have bought that they want blessed. By virtue of laying whatever it is on the stone, it becomes holy (if you're Catholic, I guess). I let G pat her fat baby hands on it. This flat stone is where Jesus was laid as he was taken off the cross, where he was hastily anointed and wrapped for burial because of the encroaching Sabbath. If you remember the women went back to the tomb on Sunday morning because they hadn't been able to do it the way they wanted. So Jesus, broken and dead, was laid on this actual stone.

It was as I put G up onto this stone and let her pat it that I was seriously moved by the Historical Reality of the cross. This is so important to Christianity-that God really broke into history, that it is verifiable, that it is not some ephemeral spiritual weirdness. I've had this experience before, most of us have, where our heart knowledge of God finally intersects with our head knowledge of God and we Know on a whole new level.

And finally, these are little crosses carved into the walls of the church by the crusaders (so Matt tells me), a sort of ancient, spiritual graffiti.

Setting the Scene (long after the fact)

Here is the fabulous modern hotel where the conference was centered. Most of us were scattered around Jerusalem in other hotels. This hotel was the nicest and this lounge was actually Very comfortable, with helpful young ladies bringing endless rounds of coffee, tea, glasses of wine, and cake. Oh, and french fries. Here is Matt with his computer.

Here am I, with computer and baby.


Here is the shiny white piano which was played every night.

Pictures the Ophel Gardens

On Wednesday evening the whole group made their way to the Ophel Gardens, the steps leading up to the Temple, for Worship and an official greeting from the Minister of Tourism. We had an excellent teaching about the steps themselves. They are the original steps of the Second Temple Period (boy I hope I am remembering this correctly) and it is believed that Jesus himself walked up them (at least the bottom ones, they may have been added to near the top) and into the temple, and that Peter preached from them at Pentecost, and very likely Paul spent time there as well. In other words, we gathered at the place the church was born at Pentecost. They are situated right above the ancient City of David and from them you can see the Mount of Olives and the hills of Judea.

That particular day we (Matt and I) had meant to go with the whole group to see the Holy Sepulcher and the Via Delarosa but we ended up in some horrible film like series of ridiculousness whereby we repeatedly missed each other over the course of a whole hour, and then we recriminated each other loudly and unpleasantly in front of Gadget Vicar and Ashley Noll (have I already posted on this?). We were forced to sit and have coffee/tea until the second bus. Turns out it would been been too exhausting for us to go with the whole group. God knows what we need most of all.


Hot Tired GAFCON Baby

Archbishop Akinola and the Israeli Minister of Tourism greeting each other. The assembled primates were all given a bible and certificates of pilgrimage. We all received certificates later.

A Mikveh (sp?) ceremonial cleansing bath. Several hundred have been excavated right there in the shadow of the temple but it is believed that at the time of Jesus more than 1000 were in use at that particular sight. After Peter preached at Pentecost and 3000 came to faith they were probably baptized in all the baths right there.

Young Muslim boy looking down from the Dome of the Rock while we all worship Jesus loudly and longly.

One thousand two hundred GAFCON pilgrims trying to organize into Provincial Groups for Pictures in less that 20 minutes against the backdrop of the temple.

View towards the Mount of Olives. Looks like a funeral is in progress.

Archbishop Akinola with serious Israeli security in tow.

The worship choir that led the singing all week.

We Have a Province!

Can you believe it? I can scarcely believe. God is so good.

Home Again Home Again

I've wrestled all the little kiddos into bed, fully expecting them to end up with me in a few minutes. Matt will be home tomorrow evening. Thanks for praying. More blogging tomorrow.

A Logistical Miracle

I said a few days ago that this conference happening at all is a complete miracle. As the week has progressed, this has only become more apparent. Logistically, moving 1200 people around this city, and then today into Galilee, had to have been daunting. There have been a few little hiccups here and there, but over all, to the letter, things have gone beautifully. (I’m really sorry I’m not able to think of interesting words to describe things tonight—I just have to get it down, even uninterestingly, and hopefully describe it better later as I assimilate it all).

The organizers of this event have thought of Everything. When getting on buses to go to the Ophel Gardens, there were boxes and boxes of water bottles being handed out (same with the Mount of Olives). Today (Saturday) we lunched by the Jordan River (well, tiny Jordan trickle, mainly dry river bed), under huge shade trees. A crew came in, set up tables and chairs, set out table clothes, set out hot food and cold drinks (pita bread, chicken, beef, salads, rice, potatoes, watermelon, I could go on and on). Everyone ate lavishly and then they took all the tables down and the chairs were rearranged for worship.

Another logistical miracle has been the organizing of the Statement and the Work Groups. TEC has blathered unhelpfully for years and years about ‘lay leadership’ (in our own diocese there were meetings, grumbling, complaining, desperate attempts to get the laity to ‘be involved’ and ‘do more’ etc.) without actually making it a substantial part of ecclesiastical life. Sure, people do things in their own churches, and of course there’s Bonnie Anderson, lay woman extraordinaire, battling her way across the country, but not like Anything I have experienced here in the last few days. The work groups have been carefully formed to include Bishop, Priest, often Deacon, and Lay people. Everyone discusses together the questions (or anything they want), writes down what they feel is most important at the end of the session and submits it to the Conference leadership/drafting committee who read everything and write accordingly. Most groups have At Least One Bishop, often more. The level playing field—everyone talking together from their own “context” has been lively, enlightening, encouraging and, frankly, fun. Plus, my group has passed our GAFCON baby up and down, everyone getting a turn. I have every confidence that what comes from this council is not just the will of the Bishops or Primates, but of the whole body gathered together. I’m also really moved and encouraged that every possible order (lay, clergy, bishop) was invited without fuss or loud trumpeting. Its no big deal, it’s the whole church together.

If you’re looking for the work of the Holy Spirit in the world, look no further. It takes the power of God to make something like this happen.

Thursday and Friday and Saturday in Review (as far as I can remember)

The sun is setting which means the beginning of Shabbat. Everything is shutting down. The restaurant downstairs is staffed by Arabs (I hope I'm using the correct qualifier) whereas the hotel upstairs is staffed by Jews. In this way everything continues to run 'smoothly' for all hotel guests.

Across the room from me is a Jewish woman sitting reading a book-looks like a Bible. This hotel in particular (and the one we are in) is very Jewish oriented. The restaurants are kosher and in the evening many young couples populate this coffee lounge talking chasedly and embarrassingly to each other.

I appreciate very much the modesty abounding here. The Muslim women dress beautifully. The Jewish women dress beautifully. So far from buttoning up and looking to repel every thing that even slightly resembles a man, the modesty codes are thoroughly lovely. In every shop, on every corner, I see something that I could imagine myself wearing, which never happens to me in America. If I had my druthers, I would dress this way all the time, and so would my girls. Hmmm.

Today was spent working on the GAFCON communique or statement that will be released on Sunday. I won't say anything about it until Sunday after it is released. Don't want to spoil it for you.

Yesterday, after the morning workshop, Matt and Baby (or rather GAFCON BABY! as she has come to be known) and I went back into Old City Jerusalem to the Holy Sepulcher. I'm going to post about it separately because there's a lot to say.


Today we went to Galilee-to Caperneum particularly and to the Mount of the Beatitudes, which also needs to be its own post.

Overall, I am completely overwhelmed. I feel a little like I'm sitting in front of a vast banquet and I'm likely to go hungry because I don't know what to eat first. I think its going to take me months to sort through everything and remember it all and write it down. Its completely true, if someone wanted to write down everything that Jesus said and did and all the people he healed and all the interactions he had, there wouldn't be enough pages, enough books to do it.

Tomorrow we review again and accept the Statement and there is the closing Eucharist. So, I'm going to post this and try to keep writing. I'm going to post little by little the things that come to mind so that I don't miss too much.

Wednesday in Review

Almost ready to pack up and go to the hotel. Matt and I are sharing a cord back and forth, as our batteries dwindle. We've had a pretty good day-excellent talk in the morning in my group by Edith Humphrey. I took notes all by hand so I don't know when I'll get them online, if ever. The afternoon we went to the Ophel Gardens for Evening Prayer and more formal Pilgrimage pictures. We meant to go into the Old City with the tour and see Christ Church and the Holy Sepulcher but we entered into a deeply frustrating and movie like experience of repeatedly missing each other in the crowds trying to find the tour buses leading us to deeply recriminate against each other in front of famous and important people loudly in the lounge. We were forced to have a cup of tea and take the late bus just for prayer.

This evening I went quietly to hear the focus topic (see live blog below) while Matt kept the baby. Very Refreshing.
So we are going to sleep while you are all waking. Today, as you work and play and do every good thing, Pray for GAFCON! Pray for the Anglican Communion!


Notes to my mother
Well, mommy, I've just said hello to Professor Sanneh, at great personnel embarrassment. I very much felt like when Auntie Kay insisted that I go say hello to Franklin Graham because she had been to Wheaton with his father.
Also, would you like a big floating light colorful Israeli wrap skirt or a pillow cushion or some kind of hanging? Or something that I haven't even thought of. I'm going shopping tomorrow. Also, Gadget Vicar has been very cuddling Gwendolyn and was honored to do so.

Pictures from Monday (not as many as I wanted because its so !!! slow downloading pictures)
Bishops on the Mount of Olives

Gwendolyn in the Garden of Gethsemene. She should be weeping but instead she is rejoicing in...I don't know. The sun? The power of the Holy Spirit? Her fabulous hat.

My "Live" Blog of This Evening's Focus Topic

There were three Speakers on the topic "The Gospel and Religion". I'm just putting it straight up. If I pause to correct it, it won't ever see the light of your screen. Enjoy!

Professor Lamin Sanneh
The fall of Constantinople and the Fall of the Twin Towers: the Muslim world and the west

Thank you to the organizers of this conference.
We are living in Jerusalem, in case we haven’t noticed. I am delighted to stand in this Holy City. I had been a student here in the 60s and I remember being burdened by a sense (worked out later) that Christianity seems peculiar in its troubled nature in the holy land. It does not have its Bethlehem and Jerusalem.

Pilgrimage has different rhythms. Three central stages to classical pilgrimage
1. Preparation and Separation. We have had such a preparation. This time is supposed to break the habits of routine and daily practice, shaking up our sense of who we are and where we are. Separation is a stage of consciousness.
2. Transition. We are a transit people. We are going somewhere and we have left somewhere. In this stage of being in between we are supposed to concentrate. We don’t know yet where we are going to be and we are not where we were.
3. Incorporation. Received and given a new identity. We have formed a new sense of community. When we go back home, we will not be the same as we were when we left. This is a process, a path.
Great Muslim scholars have written of this.
I am aware of Jerusalem in that sense. We belong and yet we must go back, but hopefully not the same.
Time constraint forces me to summarize my paper in a scandalously brief way.

The violence that erupted following Pope Ben with reference to Holy War and reason. IT is difficult to argue that the crusades are to blame for inter religious tension. The mongul wars brought about the collapse of the caliphat.
The ghost of the crusade is a reflection of that fact, of the crusades, to reposes the birthplace of Christ. They lost their apetite and wared against each other. Islam was spared and bolstered by this collapse.

John of Segoria--Peaceful engagement for Islam. Follow peace rather than violence, harming the church and not impacting islam. The crusades have taught us that much.
Nicholas …1461:…
The explarations of the new world had immense implications for slavery, for the west.

A new chapter of violence with the twin towers. A new wave of ‘jihad’ as Saladin promised. The attacks confronted the dilemma between fighting and possibly inflaming matters, cultural diplomacy.
The time has come to mobilize resources in Judeo Xn world to counter these threats. Foster a culture of liberty and persuasion.
The unassailable evidence that the church has made giant strides against state oppression.

An example: a little known group of Islam in North Africa who have embraced pacifism. They told him this story: They won’t go to war but they like to obey the king. The king has given us a choice to build a castle or go to war. We have said that if he asks us to build him a castle, we will build him a castle, if he asks us to go to war, we will build him a castle.

If they ask me to talk about the challenge of translatability. If they ask me to talk about the challenge of Islam, I will talk about the challenge of translatability. I am entirely at their disposal. This is how some of my students treated their exam questions.

GAFCON belongs to a bigger a movement of world wide Christianity.
When he lived in Nigeria, he taught as a tutor and in the afternoons he would prepare his lecture. In the morning he would go to the market to buy fish and provisions. On the way to the market, he would be climbing over bodies of worshippers near the railway tracks which were near the airport. The seminar was about the end of colonialism in Africa and the end of Christianity. As he climbed over the bodies of worshippers and went to the doctor because he couldn’t sleep because of all the worshippers, and yet the seminar was about the end of Christianity. But he didn’t see it. The categories of ‘colonial’ ‘post colonial’ entrapped him so that he did not see it.

-Christianity is marginal in the land of its birth, it has no birthplace, no territorial call.
-It is not Gnostic, no special language
-It has no one name for God.

The youruba name for God became the name of God in the OT, the God of the Covenant. That would never have in Islam. This fantastic implications for history, theology.

Christianity is invested in languages that existed for purposes other than Christianity. It doesn’t invent language, it adopts it. This makes an enormous difference to the process of conversion, to religious and moral integration. It is a translated religion.

It is not limited to any one set of languages using cultural criteria. If the suppression of the vernacular leads to an inhibition of Christian spread. If a lingua franca is insisted upon it suppresses the spread of Christianity.

Translation in language domain parallels translation in divine revelation. The audacity of the incarnation. God who became man, it was so offensive to the Romans, to the Jews.

Translation rejects the idea of a superior language or culture. No language or culture is so elevated it can claim exclusive access to the truth of God. None is so marginal or remote it can be excluded. None are dispensable or unworthy. Christian anthropology of culture: the claims of the gospel deny normative exclusiveness to any culture so that superior cultures are relativised and brought down. Not only brings the gospel, but brings life to culture. The Arabic of the street was chosen for translation, not of the Koran. Same with Chinese. By picking the common language, it privileges the language and culture, bringing about religious revolution and social and cultural ones as well.

There is nothing that God wants to say to us that cannot be said in every day ordinary language. It opened missionaries to the charge of political and social subversion. But rather it creates new life for all language.

It is invested in language and culture. Over 90 percent of grammars and dictionaries around the world were created by missionaries around the world, allowing language to be preserved…
After 1960, christianity exploded, after colonialism.

He has spent much of his professional life defending the right of Africans to be Christian. The genius of Christianity is that it is able to repeat for Africans what it did for Europeans. For 200 years English was forbidden for Christians. Tyndale was burned. English was an unclean vernacular. Africa abounded in the gift of tongues.

It is impossible without language how to worship God, to have personality. Africa is profoundly endowed with the gift of language. It birthed Comparative Linguistics.

GAFCON belongs to the tremendous sweep of Christianity around the world. In loosing its territory, it was swept around the world, the heart of Christianity is in the heart of every believer.
Paul never contemplated coming to Jerusalem without fear for his life. He worked his whole life to bring Jew and Gentile together. GAFCON must embrace the rhythm and momentum of the Christian renewal that has more ahead of it than behind it. Let us not consume the energy and movement in internal disputes, explanations, definitions. Converts have arrived without infrastructure, without wealth, without plans. GAFCON is part of the wave of the future. Link to movements that are happening around the world, transcending nationality, race and language.


Dr. Salim Munayer
Palestinian Christian/Isreali, from a small village (didn’t get the name). Able to trace his family to the 12th century. In 1948 the city of Falidi was conquered by the Israeli army, they were ordered to go to Jordan, passing by the church his great great grandfather built. Maybe to find shelter in the church—1200 Christians found refuge and there became refugees. Traumatic time all this time. It is now a mixed city. Was sent, then, to Jewish High School. And there studied Jewish History and the justification for the state of Israelis which is predicated upon ‘Christian’ persecution in the West.
The issue of your ethnic religious context, in this land particular. The conflict of this land is destroying this land and not giving us room to breath. To be a minority Palestinian and then Christian—he began to search for answers to this painful conflict. His uncle put an add in the paper, a Christian Israeli answered, a group was formed of Palestinian Christians and Jews. There he because a Christian, studying the Bible with this man. The cross not only reconciled him to God, but to the people around him.

The situation, the conflict is going to lead to an explosion.
The theological questions his students later asked, ‘from the village to the college every evening and morning I go through the check point and I am going to be mistreated, what would Jesus do?’

‘what do we do about the land that we were going to build on but was taken from us?’
‘what do we do at the Bible college? What people are in the bible?’ ‘I don’t want to learn about the people who are hurting me’.

Why do we come on pilgrimage? To see Jesus?

The Bible that we cherish suddenly seemed to work against their ethnic identity.
Tried to bring Palestinian Christians and Messianic Jews together for conversations. Ends up in argument.

Theology of reconciliation of the cross is
1. justice for the Palestinian Christian
2. hope for the Jewish Christian


Rev. Evan Thomas
First large significant Anglican gathering in Jerusalem, is that it? Better late than never.
In Hebrew: blessed are those who come in the name of the Lord, be blessed in the house of the Lord.
Thank you for this unique privilege. The opportunity to address you in this important week. Indigenous messianic Jewish community, he commends us on our courage to take this stand. The leaders of his church convey their love and greetings to us all. They want us to know that they stand with us in the position we are taking and pray it will bring much fruit and the numbers we see coming to faith, in Africa especially, will be seen throughout the world, in the west. They pray that this church will be a great tool in God’s hands for this.
Whether we believe that Israel is an act of God or an aberration of history, it is important to believe that the challenge for reconciliation requires a messianic presence. Reconciliation theology will always point to Ephesians 2:14-16 “he himself is our peace”. His community and Salime’s personify these words. They are locked in an ‘uncontrollable conflict’. The attrition effect of security issues, of military occupation, of terrorism, brings a continual state of uncertainty. It effects world view and robs us of hope. Jesus has destroyed the dividing wall of hostility, but in our hearts the temptation is always there to reerect the wall.
He lives in the narrowest part of the Israel—only 16 kilometers along the west bank. During the first 6 months of the intefada, 16 attacks were carried out. That was the beginning of the security wall which ended the attacks. They were safe, but now truly divided. How would this effect the most basic fellowships of Christians on both sides of the wall.
‘If anyone says he loves God and hates his brother, he is a liar…whoever loves God must love his brother’. For us to be true disciples of Christ, we must commit ourselves to pursuing peace, even at the cost of social disloyalty or challenging our belief systems.
1. The conflict is very complex. For example, while the Oslo peace accords tried to work it out, it has never worked.
2. Our respective collective memories are very different. Intentionally perpetuate our own versions through education and commemoration. To understand better, they brought leaders together to relate about this common history of the creation of the Jewish state, and then step into each other’s shoes and role play the events. This simple act was so powerful…
3. The enormous imbalance of power. This includes the military, economic and political power. Israel controls all energy and much of the water supply. They were able to bring Gaza to its knees by stopping all fuel supplies. This imbalance is reflected when faith communities are brought together, create a level playing fields. Hard to not be in charge and dominate the dialogue.
4. Dehumanization and Demonisation. Example, as a soldier, he was patting someone down, he recognized him, his brother, his enemy. Demonisation occurs in identifying God with yourself, and the enemy as the instrument of the devil, justifying the use of violence.
5. Identity: parts of it are positive (language, history, culture) at the same time our total identification with one group means problems in relating to others. For a long time, his pastor’s group was exclusive to his group. He was convicted that this should cease. Came with a strong challenge—where is the rest of our family? Where are our brothers? It was interesting that the position of exclusion was on the pretext that it would hinder our prayer for the nation, that it would confuse theology. For most messianic Jews, prophetic scripture about the language is inseparable from basic theology. For four years now they have had combined retreats. Arab brothers base their identity in the cross. This brings a healthy dynamic.
At the end of the day, Israelis and Palestinians are living in very small house as a very dysfunctional family. These obstacles are that, they need to be faced with understanding and with the authority that is ours in the name that is above every name. We are light and salt, together. We have to do so understanding that we live amongst our very troubled peoples.

Come back. But don’t just come to see the stones. Come to connect, to build relationships with the living stones of the land. Peace be with you all.

Tuesday in Review

Summery of the Day
It’s the end of another long day. Matt is buying me a fancy glass of wine and holding the baby so that I can write for a little bit. I haven’t even had time to read what he has written, let alone that of anyone else. Today we have been entirely here in the hotel. The morning was taken up with worship, prayer, bible study and finally workshops. I am in the Marriage and Family workshop and Matt is in Bible Interpretation. They were both very good. Part of the work will be to help contribute to the general conference statement at the end of the week. The afternoon I meant to sit and blog but instead I sat and watched Matt blog, miraculously, thinking all the time that his computer was plugged in, when in fact it wasn’t. He typed for two hours without power on a battery that was nearly empty. Just another small miracle. I talked happily to GadgetVicar while we watched him type. In the evening we heard from Archbishop Nazir-Ali and then divided into provincial groups to discuss our hopes and expectations for our time at GAFCON. So that’s the breakdown of the day. And I’ve finally gotten the first slew of pictures off my camera. I’ll try to put a couple up this evening, depending on my internet connection.

At two am this morning I wrote 3 blog posts in my head. Of course, I can’t lay my mind on them now, but I am going to offer various thoughts under headings. I just want to get them down before they’re completely gone.

The Peace of Jerusalem
Yesterday, on the Mount of Olives, during the open prayer time, someone prayed for the peace of Jerusalem, that all the various religious groups living side by side in the city would get along. I prayed along whole heartedly with the prayer but was troubled all the way down the mountain. What exactly do we mean, when we pray for the peace of this city? Why is it called the city of peace when that is not the actual state of this place, of being at peace? And then, as probably greater and more wonderful people than me have known for a long time, I realized and saw, looking out at the Dome of the Rock, that this is the nexus of disunity on the earth. This is the place, on earth, where division and sorrow is more manifest than any other place on earth. Indeed, there is ‘peace’, it is a place where people live side by side in uneasy toleration of each other. But the divisions between Christian, Jew and Muslim are perhaps the deepest of any division known on earth.

It was so unnerving, walking slowly down the mountain, or rather slipping down the road, so worn by the feet of pilgrims and residents that it is smooth. This, now paved road, was the road Jesus walked so many times in his life, perhaps every year for Passover, and then as an adult over and over. But the last time we walked that road he stopped and wept, perhaps a little for himself and the passion he faced, but more for the people in the city, the people of that city who were poised to ultimately and entirely reject him. Here was God, walking amongst them, loving them in the way they were created to be loved, giving his whole self to them, and they didn’t want him. In open defiant rebellion they killed God in the city where had chosen of all places on the earth to live, to make a name for himself, to dwell. No wonder then that in the same way that Jerusalem was so long the locus of God’s presence on earth, it is now the locus of all the division of the earth, all the strife, all the rebellion. And it will remain so until Jesus returns in glory.

Catechesis of the Good Shepherd and Jerusalem
Today I bought the wooden cut outs of a miniature Ark of the Covenant. At home I will snap it out and glue it together. I am trying to convince Matt to let me buy the temple—full replication. It would be so cool to have in the atrium.

On that note, I will say that working with the City of Jerusalem Material—painting it, drawing it on the board, making the little trees, and then using the material with the children—has made the experience of walking through the streets of Jerusalem…I’m groping for a word…there are no words. I’m just very grateful to have worked so much with that particular material.

The other very helpful visual has been the impact of shade. Talking about the greatness of the mustard tree, grown out of such a tiny seed, the need for shade, for the beauty of the tree will have much more depth for me in the atrium.

We are going to Bethlehem and Galilee on Saturday and I hope to gain much more insight and depth into atrium life there.

Those long promised thoughts on Parenting
Just as I was coming here, KA asked for a good recommendation on Parenting and I will take this opportunity to recommend our Favorite: Douglas Wilson’s Standing in the Promises. It has completely changed our lives as parents. I can’t recommend it enough for Godly, mature, high functioning parents. I wouldn’t probably recommend it so much for newly converted families or ones with serious problems. Here’s why I recommend it so highly.

So on the plane from JFK to Prague they lined all the babies up along the bulkhead—a total of 4 babies. The couple on my right had a four month baby whom they cuddled and doted over and managed to keep from crying nearly the whole flight. On the far left was a woman by herself with her baby, tired but in control. Then me, and then the Last Couple. Let me just say that the airline provided baby food for all of us and wonderful little bassinet things that fixed to the bulkhead of the plane so the babies could sleep, if they would. So, on to the Last Couple.

They were Czech, looking middle aged, very smiley and nice. They had two boys, maybe 5 or 6 and then one just under two, almost exactly the size and personality of my own R, and sensibly cute with fat cheeks, tree trunk legs, and a large gold cross affixed around his neck. This small guy, like the babies, had to be strapped to his mother for take off and landing. Not surprisingly, this was not in his plans and expectations and he screamed with the full force of his fat body to let us all know that. Instead of quietly telling him to stop crying, two things happened. First, the father did NOTHING. He sat back in his seat and gazed about him as if nothing was happening. And second, his mother succumbed and unbuckled the belt and put him down. This little process happened a total of 6 times before the plane took off. Each time his mother would pick him up, strap him in, he would scream, his father would do nothing, the mother would let him down and then a Flight Attendant would come, give the poor little persecuted guy a big hug, wiping away his giant tears, give him a candy, tell him to be good, and leave, only to have it all happen again in three minutes.

If you read the book, this poor couple’s mistakes will stand out like a Casino Billboard. First, it is the father’s responsibility to administer discipline. The second this little guy started wailing, his dad should have taken him from his mother, put the fear of God into his little unsanctified heart, given him a big loving hug, and strapped him on with firm instructions not to cry again. Second, his father having abdicated his responsibility to undertake to discipline him, his mother should have Won. You have to win Every Time, every time. One time of screaming, if you win, and the screaming is all done. Third, he shouldn’t have needed the outside aid and comfort of the Air Attendant because he should have known, through loving discipline, the boundary that he needed.

That’s the short hand. Hopefully, at a later moment, I will talk about dealing with sin and rebellion in children, a la Doug Wilson, and what a peaceful and joy filled home in produces. But onwards and upwards

The Anglican Communion
Is alive and well. I don’t have any idea what will be the substance and direction of this Council in the coming days, but this place is alive with Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. As part of the communion is dying, like the huge big gnarled olive trees of the Garden of Gethsemane, so a new shoot of Anglicanism, a vibrant healthy, strong church is being grafted in to replace it. I fully expect this to take one or two hundred years, but its going to be so great when it’s a full alive beautiful tree. In the meantime, watch and pray.

Being Here with Matt
Its 10:30. Matt is sitting here very nicely and boredly with me while I have my turn on the outlet. We haven’t had much of a chance to talk to each other, running from talk to talk, conversation to conversation, tepid tea break to fancy coffee, but its jolly nice to be here together. I’m having a thoroughly good time, and so is Matt, even though he is having to fork over the big shekels to be allowed to work out in the weight room every day, with the right shoes on of course, and is drinking unstrained coffee grounds every morning because I forgot to bring his French Press. We couldn’t be happier.

Smatterings of the Holy City

I have been admitted into the inner sanctum of the press room, that holy hushed place of writing and surfing. Matt, anointed once again for this time by the Holy Spirit with the special gift of typing fast and accurately, has written a whole page while I have fussed with my cord, fussed with the baby, dithered over my email, and wondered how on earth to bring into language Any of the past 48 hours.

In a few minutes I will have to pack all this up again and go up for the Opening Eucharist, Archbishop Orombi speaking and presiding. Matt, doubtless, will have it online by its conclusion.

The morning was spent at the Mount of Olives, thousands of pilgrims (one thousand, at least, of us, many more of other countries and denominations) making their way from the top with a clear, pristine, heart rending view of the Dome of the Rock, right smack in the middle of the Temple Courts, down to the bottom to the Garden of Gethsemane.

I was accosted, in the Garden of Gethsemane by a small Canadian woman who told me that 'she was a Kennedy too, are you Irish?'
'My husband is' I lied, well, not totally a lie, he's a Little Bit Irish and a lot bit Norwegian. I didn't tell her that we were Anglican either, felt it would probably ruin her experience of Jesus in the Garden. She admired the baby and then told me reverently how beautiful Ireland is.

Another other thoroughly enjoyable moment of the morning was watching Archbishop Orombi pose for pictures with a whole slew of Chinese pilgrims. I'm not sure if they thought he was part of the landscape, or the package. Matt was dismissive, 'while you were in the church,'he said, 'they all had their pictures taken with the Baby.'

Why these small pass-by-able details?
At the moment of landing, in Tel Aviv, all the thoughts and hopes I had saved up to think of especially on that occasion, all of them fled from my mind and my body and I have only been able to say over and over again and over again, 'My heart is fixed, O Lord, my heart is firmly fixed.' I don't think, in the whole course of my small life, that I have ever been given so enormously great a gift of Gratitude, of Thanksgiving, of seeking the face of Jesus more than my own face.

Bishop Atwood, last night, attributed it to the Holy Spirit-'the anointing of the Holy Spirit in waves across the room' during It is Well With my Soul. There are a thousand small miracles that went into making this one big miracle of all of us being here. It is not even so much that this is the place Jesus walked, or the place he will return to in glory, it is what he is doing in Each Person, the obedience he is working, the gratitude, the joy, the hope, and all through the Holy Spirit, showing us Jesus, drawing us to the Father.

My heart is Fixed, O Lord, my heart is firmly fixed.

Finally, a moment Online

Matt and I have been engaged in Intermarriage Blog Wars since we met up with each other in the airport yesterday (and what an airport! I would happily live the rest of my life just in the airport). As soon a we got into this room he dropped everything and has been blogging persistently and selfishly ever since. I was forced to take a long and restful bath, arranged and unpack and watch David Jeremiah preach a long and depressing sermon about Sampson and Delilah.

Matt has already described the beautiful drive from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem (I'm not going to link him, for personal reasons, heh). I was distracted from looking out the window by talking to interesting people. We are on the 10th floor of the very interesting Moriah (honestly, I don't know how to spell it) Gardens Hotel next door to the main conference hotel. When we arrived (at 7pm in the evening) they didn't have a room ready for us so we struggled our way down into the bowels of the hotel with stroller, luggage, baby, shedding little bits of baby food and baby pacifiers out of my wrecked carry on. There were all sorts of interesting looking salads and meats and a vast array of dessert and then, in the room next to us, a raucous Shabbat service carrying on (there was actually another Shabbat service going on upstairs in the lobby with a Rabbi shouting at one or two listeners while children ran around screaming and adults talked to each other, doing their best, it seems, to ignore the Rabbi). We tried everything and then finally made our way up to this very nice room with a Very Nice View.

Now we are wandering around in a stupor trying to get ready for church. Matt is recriminating against me for not packing his coffee. I am recriminating against myself forgetting the One Top I intended to bring and bringing all the other ones I didn't really need.

After church we will try and register and pursue some shops and then everything kicks off this evening. Forthcoming, though belated, are my thoughts about the parenting style of the people next to me on the Flight from JFK to Prague.

Thank You for Praying

We are all three here safely, comfortably settled, with All Our Bags-Nothing Went Missing. Amazing. Not surprisingly, I am Way Tired. The baby has been sleeping on and off all day, but I haven't. Intead of staying up and writing incoherently, I am going to go to bed.

Lay Over, without the Laying

Blogger looks cool in Czeck (I am sitting here and I do not know how to spell it) but this keyboard is crazy. I cannot find how to do an apostrophe. Heh.

So I had a whole lot of things I wanted to write, but I do not think I have the mental capabilities to figure out how to type it all, at this time. Instead, I am going to take my dubious cup of warm tepid tea, well, tea is not the word I am groping for, and go write it all out by hand so that when I can type, I will not forget what I was planning to say.

Of course, baby has now collapsed in exhaustion after diligently staying awake for the last seven hours. She will get a nice restful nap in preparation for the next flight, while I wander around awake.

Later today, in Jerusalem. Exclamation Point.

Traveling Mercies

Trying desperately to jam my small travel teapot into my bag even though it wasn't on the list of suggested things to bring. All the children weeping and weeping. So difficult now that some of them are sentient but still enable to conceptualize time. At Matt's direction, will be buying internet connections whenever possible. Blogging, hopefully, will be constant and enthralling.

Pray for me! I'm flying in the air, which is ridiculous for human beings to attempt, given that we are not birds. I'm going to spend more than 24 hours with an 8 month old baby who thinks she can walk and should be walking all the time, and one who has a powerful set of lungs for her surprisingly tiny body. What a good time we are all going to have.

Tomorrow in Jerusalem!