Dear friend,
They have favorite meals that their grandmother cooked, and their feet need socks when they’re cold at night. Like you and me. The people who are directly affected by the war in the Holy Land are all people.
Say a prayer for peace, however small and unimportant it may feel to you.
To prepare for Holy Week — commemorating events tied to Christ’s death, I want to share some very memorable Holy Land places you may have never realized exist. I pray pilgrims will someday be able to return to them.
Dominus Flevit Church
As he drew near, he saw the city and wept over it, saying, “If this day you only knew what makes for peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will raise a palisade against you; they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides. They will smash you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another within you because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.” (Luke 19:41-44)
Imagine standing on a hill, looking out, and seeing a valley that separates your hill from the walled city of Jerusalem. This is the view from Dominus Flevit Church, which commemorates the place where The Lord Wept (in Latin, Dominus Flevit). Architect Antonio Barluzzi, whose work pilgrims can appreciate throughout the Holy Land, designed this small church inspired by a teardrop shape.
Visiting the interior is a somber experience, as the coloring inside is dark, muted. The primary window behind the altar features a grate highlighting the sacrifice and suffering of Jesus.
Dominus Flevit is located on the Mount of Olives. One must walk down into the Kidron Valley from here, then up to the walled Old City of Jerusalem, to follow the path of Jesus on his last visit prior to his death.
The Mount of Olives, Luke tells us, was Jesus’ hideaway:
During the day, Jesus was teaching in the temple area, but at night he would leave and stay at the place called the Mount of Olives. (21:37)
My time here helped me connect with Jesus’ emotional experience. He had a getaway, where he spent time praying and with his closest friends. On the Mount of Olives, you’ll also find the Church of Pater Noster (Our Father), with a grotto where tradition says Jesus taught his disciples to pray the Lord’s Prayer. So, this was a very special place for him; he came here to rest, to pray, and… to weep.
It means something beyond expression that God wept, that God became like us, that he had a favorite hangout and a special place to be vulnerable with the Heavenly Father.
Today, our dopamine-trained brains can often struggle to express how we feel except through the isolated, electronic tools which society hands us. Here’s a reminder: We aren’t limited to the inadequacies of emojis and memes. We need a favorite place to get away. We need people with whom we can simply sit and breathe. We need to cry sometimes. We need space to grieve, and process, and pray.
St. Peter Gallicantu
A little later the bystanders came over and said to Peter, “Surely you too are one of them; even your speech gives you away.” At that he began to curse and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately a cock crowed. Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken: “Before the cock crows you will deny me three times.” He went out and began to weep bitterly. (Matthew 26:73-75)
Southwest of Dominus Flevit and the Garden of Gethsemane is one of my favorite churches in the area, built over the house of Caiaphas, where Jesus was held after his arrest. Named for Peter’s famous denial at the cock’s crow (gallicantu), here pilgrims come face to face with our frail humanity.
Outside, we see the Sacred Steps, an ancient stairway which the captive Jesus trod. A metal sculpture commemorates Peter’s vehement denial of Jesus.
Inside this church is one of the most memorable experiences a pilgrim can have in the Holy Land, but requires traveling in a small group.
Perhaps we never think about it, but Jesus spent time in prison. His prison cell is located here, carved into rock. Unlike the other underground chambers, Christ’s — now called the Sacred Pit — is a deep cistern into which he was lowered, by a rope tied around his waist.
Now, a simple staircase has been carved for pilgrims down into the cistern, where a large book of Scripture is opened to Psalm 88, allowing us to pray what we presume Jesus would have prayed by memory…
I am reckoned with those who go down to the pit;
I am like a warrior without strength.
…
You plunge me into the bottom of the pit,
into the darkness of the abyss.
As I stood in that dark pit, I realized that Jesus had experienced solitary confinement. He tasted some of our loneliness and mental tortures. I touched the side of the pit and imagined that Jesus could have placed his hand on that same spot.
Healing comes in a chapel at St. Peter Gallicantu where we see a triptych of icons highlighting the only two times in Scripture mentioning a “charcoal fire” (ἀνθρακιά):
Peter by the charcoal fire, denying Jesus three times.
Peter in a cave, weeping bitterly. (Pictured below.)
Peter by the charcoal fire, affirming his love for Jesus three times, as Jesus hands him a shepherd’s staff.
As I contemplate Jesus going down into the pit, and his intentional meeting with Peter who denied him, I see hope. Even in our lowest places, Jesus meets us and offers us mercy.
I am truly in awe of this God.
The Stone Pavement
When Pilate heard these words he brought Jesus out and seated him on the judge’s bench in the place called Stone Pavement, in Hebrew, Gabbatha. It was preparation day for Passover, and it was about noon. And he said to the Jews, “Behold, your king!”
They cried out, “Take him away, take him away! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your king?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.” Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.
(John 19:12-16)
Wander through the narrow alleys of Old Jerusalem along the Via Dolorosa, and you’ll come to Ecce Homo (Latin: “behold the man”) Pilgrim House and the Convent of the Sisters of Zion.
The location of the Stone Pavement or Lithostrotos (Greek), where Jesus would have been held by Pilate’s soldiers, is debated. One presumed place is here, where in 1864 ancient Roman flagstone pavement was discovered including soldiers’ etched-in games. One game centers around a crown and letter B (for the Greek basileus, king), which led to the theory that here Jesus was mocked.
As my shoes almost glided over the smooth flagstone pavement, I found myself contemplating the raw humanity in Jesus’ torture and ridicule. I looked over to the “King’s Game” etched in the stone as my pilgrim group prayed the Chaplet of Divine Mercy.
These soldiers had no idea what they were doing. It was another day of work for them. Their jobs had trained them to treat people like objects. Amid the stress of chaotic crowd control and Roman-Jewish sociopolitical power struggles, the human-est part of them needed a laugh to retain sanity. Jesus, wearing their makeshift crown and robe, suffered so that they could have that laugh.
How often we are quick to condemn the sins of others, and quick to excuse our own.
Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)
Friends, I pray for you a blessed Holy Week. Remember to pray for the Holy Land. If you attend church on Good Friday, there should be a collection for the people of the Holy Land. Peace be with you.
Thank you for this awesome virtual tour!