One of the joys of living out here is the welcome sight of the large envelopes stuffed in my tiny post box twice a week. These will inevitably be the Church Times sent care of friends in the Diocese of Greater Manchester and The Catholic Tablet, sent care of a friend and colleague in the Centre for Jewish Studies at Manchester University.
I started out reading the church press two or three years ago at the request of the Jewish community in the UK, who were concerned at some of the material being published, particularly on Israel, but sometimes also on Judaism.
Since then, progress has been made and various articles written putting the other side of the coin, or simply laying out the facts as they really are. But sometimes, there are still a few misconceptions about the 'Holy Land', for instance.
Let's take the Christmas edition of The Tablet as an example:
http://www.thetablet.co.uk/issues/1000080
There was an excellent article on Burma's Buddhist monks by Laurence Feeman, for instance. He is the Director of the World Community for Christian Meditation. Take this, for example:
Many of the official sangha, the senior Buddhist clergy, are junta appointees. As in the Churches' accommodation with the Nazi regime, there can seem something of a win-win deal here.
And this:
Our sense of solidarity with the people's suffering should not fail. As the Hebrew prophets saw in their own terms, and as the courageous Burmese monks remembered, we are not permitted to pay lip service to nirvana while desecrating the holiness of the human.
This ending enscapsulates what is both best and worst in Buddhism. The writer obviously knows what he is talking about and speaks from experience.
Then, a most interesting interview with Sir Terry Leahy, head of Tesco. A Liverpool Catholic, he compares Tesco to the Catholic Church, at which all are welcome.
What I remember about the Tesco in Prestwich was the even-handed way in which they lit Chanukah lights and put signs up saying 'Happy Pesach', and were upset when some church members objected to this.
A superb article on Eleanor Farjeon, who wrote Morning has Broken, which I taught to the children in Jaffa last term. Great to know that her father was Jewish. I wonder what Cat Stevens (now known as Yusef Islam) would have thought of that. Absolutely hilarious. But not really surprising when you think of giants like Irving Berlin and George Gershwin, who somehow get into the psyche of where they are living, despite being poor immigrants, escaping from pogroms in Russia or some such place. here's the piece and the words:
http://www.cgmusic.com/cghymnal/others/m/morninghasbroken.htm
But then, the catch! In a piece, entitled Against the Odds, we have an article on 'the last completely Christian village in Palestine'. And whose fault is it that the Christian community is suffering there?
This:
Like so many other Palestinian towns and villages in the West Bank, Taybeh has lived under Israeli military occupation since 1967.
Then there is the inevitable description of the "security fence" which has had catastrophic consequences for local people, for their economy and their social well-being.
The article goes on and on in this vein. And I looked in vain for some fairness to match that of the article on Buddhists in Burma. But there was none. Where was Hamas in this? Where was its charter, which advocates the destruction of Israel? Where were the suicide bomb attacks on Israel, which the fence has been built to try and prevent. Where were the rockets fired from Gaza on Ashkelon, a small town where friends of ours live? And most of all, what about the way that the Muslim majority treats its Christian minorities, not only in the Holy Land, but all over the world.
No: at Easter and Christmas it's always the same refrain. The Jews are to blame. Islam is to be appeased, God's in His heaven and all's right with the world.
Well, it isn't Ok. And The Tablet ought to know better. And I don't totally agree with the final paragraph either:
Our Christian brothers and sisters in the Holy Land need our help and our visits.
Maybe, but so do your Jewish brothers and sisters. Which is why I'm very pleased that after the visit of a Church of England vicar from Manchester, her husband and two of her children, I'm welcoming another member of the Church of England in about a month. And hopefully she'll go back home and tell it how it really is.
And maybe the Tablet will sit up and take note and encourage some Catholics to visit, and especially Haifa. because I know some Catholics here who would really like to meet them.
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