News from Israel: Old and New

I thought it might be interesting to share a few recent news items out of Israel -- some relate to current events while others touch on the nation's ancient roots. The first item says much about the attitude of the United Nations with regard to the state of Israel.

UNRWA School in Gaza

UN Schools Teach Palestinian Children to Hate Israel and Jews. In the West Bank and Gaza the United Nations operates a number of schools attended mainly by Palestinian children. These schools, which receive funding from the United Nations' Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), use textbooks provided by the Palestinian Ministry of Education. As you might imagine, these textbooks are strongly anti-Israel. They purposely do not recognize the existence of Israel, even excluding the country from maps of the region. Equally disturbing, the books claim that the holy sites in Israel are exclusively Muslim sites, fail to mention their Jewish origins, and even accuse the Jews of trying to control them illegally. The books also contain no historical reference to the Jews or the Hebrew language. In effect these UN schools simply continue the racism and antisemitism that typify the official Palestinian position. Is it any wonder that peace between Israel and the Palestinians is so illusive since one side refuses to accept the existence of the other? It also explains the recent anti-Israel resolution passed by the UN, a resolution which the Obama administration supported by its refusal to exercise its veto.

Gaza-based Jihadist: Ban Christmas. If you're a Jihadist (aka, a terrorist) a good place to hang out is in Gaza where you will be well protected by the Palestinian authorities. You'll also have access to some cool textbooks. Anyway, one of these jokers, who's been given the label of "Senior Islamic State Jihadist," goes by the name of Abu Omar Almaqdesi. (Let's just call him Abe.) It seems Abe has been very vocal of late. Discussing recent terrorism in Turkey, Germany, and Jordan, he announced that such attacks are "the price these states must pay for positioning themselves as part of the Crusader Coalition of infidel countries fighting against Islam." Just a thought, but I suspect the German. Turkish, and Jordanian governments (or, for that matter, the US government) do not consider themselves as part of a Crusader Coalition. Too bad. If they did we might actually get somewhere in our misnamed war on terror. 

Abe also added a few seasonal comments relating to Christmas: "If somewhere there are Christians who insist on celebrating Christmas with the support of the heretic authorities, one must unleash upon them all one's might and deploy all the available means." He went on to explain that "all methods are admissible when it comes to preventing blasphemy against Allah and his commandments. Yes, including killing and blowing up." Then, apparently getting into the Christmas spirit, Abe added, "But...we believe that first you should act politely and explain that living in Islamic countries is conditioned on accepting Sharia and refrain from openly practicing rituals other than Islam." I guess after you've been polite, you can go ahead and blow them up. Don't you just love these guys? Abe sounds like a prime candidate for an extended vacation at Gitmo.

Having been promised by God to Abraham about 4,000 years ago, the Holy Land is a remarkable treasure trove for archaeologists. Like much of the Middle East, modern day Israel has lots of interesting stuff beneath its surface just waiting to be uncovered. Here are a couple of cool stories I found particularly interesting.

Egyptian Slab -- Ancient Hebrew? Inscriptions

Hebrew is #1. A Canadian archaeologist, Douglas Petrovich, has generated a whole lot of controversy among his colleagues by claiming that the Hebrew alphabet might just be the world's oldest. One can only assume his claims will not be well-received in Gaza. Petrovich believes that the Hebrews, when they were in Egypt, converted the local hieroglyphics into their own alphabet so they could express their Hebrew language in written form. He dates this alphabet to almost 4,000 years ago. He also claims to have found specific Biblical references from Genesis and Exodus -- to Moses, Ahisamach and Asenath -- as he translated various inscriptions. He's taking a lot of heat from the skeptics, but who knows? He might be right. After all, we know God was partial to Hebrew.

One of the many Temple Floor Tiles recovered

Second Temple Floor Tiles Discovered. Jerusalem's
second Temple, the one started by Herod and destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D., is now covered by a Muslim shrine. This makes excavations a bit tense since the Muslims do not want Jewish access to this holy site. The second Temple is also the Temple of the Gospels at which Jesus and his disciples worshiped. As a result of excavations that began in 2005, over 600 of the Temple's floor tiles have been found and many have been restored. These are the only known physical elements of the Temple so they are considered extremely important. They are also of interest to Christians since Jesus quite possibly walked on many of these floor tiles.

I find it amazing that today, thousands of years after these events, we continue to discover such wondrous things. And so often these finds support the Biblical narrative that so many have considered unreliable at best. It would seem that God delights in leading us to that which magnifies His Word.

Who Are Those Guys?

ISIL

The citizens of the civilized world, as well as those of us who live in the once-civilized world, are understandably appalled by the atrocities committed by ISIL. We find ourselves asking whether such brutal and inherently evil acts can be committed by sane people. Equally troubling is the obvious enthusiasm with which these men carry out these vicious acts. These young jihadists actually appear to enjoy murdering innocent men, women and children. Can this be motivated solely by religious belief or is there something else at work, something deeper, some form of mass psychosis? Such evil is evident in individual serial killers, but to encounter it wholesale in large groups of young men is profoundly disturbing. We have, of course, seen it before -- in the Nazi death camps, in the Soviet gulags, in Mao's cultural revolution, in the killing fields of Cambodia -- and we will doubtless encounter it again, long after ISIL has gone the way of its evil predecessors.

Daniel Hannan

In the meantime, though, the questions remain. Perhaps the most interesting answer is that given by Daniel Hannan, one of the few sane voices in the European Parliament. In a recent blog entry he asks, "What makes some British Muslims become jihadis?" His comments are worth reading and his advice worth heeding.

ISIL Barbarism

We have in recent years (decades?) so misused the language that it has become a challenge to comprehend exactly what some folks are trying to say. The commonplace is too often described using out-of-this-world superlatives and the truly outrageous, well, it's awesome, man. And so we're left with few words to describe adequately the activities of a collection of terrorists like ISIL. ISIL seems to recognize this and has made effective use of new media. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth many times more.

The recent beheading, on video, of an American journalist, James Foley, was turned into a viral YouTube spectacle. This says it all. (By the way, as an aside, why would anyone want to watch this gruesome video? I certainly won't, but I suspect I'm in the minority. ) Just keep in mind that this atrocity simply mirrors what these barbarians have done to so many others in both Syra and Iraq. In some strange way, then, the murder of Mr. Foley, horrendous as it was, pales when compared to the widespread enslavement and slaughter of Christian, Yazidi, and even Muslim women and children. How many of these precious innocents were beheaded, shot, and even crucified simply because of their religious beliefs? At least Mr. Foley had a choice. As a journalist he chose to travel to Syria to report on the civil war raging in that country. His kidnapping by ISIL, while not a certainty, was still a possibility. This doesn't at all mitigate the horror of his death, and it certainly doesn't excuse those who murdered him. I mention this only because the media coverage of James Foley's death has been non-stop, but how much have we heard of the hundreds, probably thousands, of faceless and nameless ISIL victims?

James Foley

I can understand the media focus on the death of one of their own. To some he was a colleague, and because he was an American his death is also a story with domestic, political overtones. But the real tragedy in Syria and Iraq -- and I believe James Foley would have agreed -- is the continual slaughter of those who resist ISIL as it terrorizes in the name of a false god. For example, read this report of the murder of an entire village of Yazidis -- over 600 people -- because one village elder refused to convert to the ISIL brand of Islam. And then read this story describing 11 elderly Iraqi Christians who also refused to convert and courageously told the ISIL thugs they would rather die. They were spared. Such stories are seldom reported by the mainstream media. Another story you won't find in the New York Times or on CNN is one describing Islam's centuries-old penchant for beheading those who resist. Here's a story on Catholic Online that does just that. (Warning: at the end of the article there are some very gruesome photos.)

We shouldn't underestimate ISIL. They have access to hundreds of millions of dollars that they will use to finance their vicious jihad. Thanks to the Iraqi army they are well-equipped with modern American weapons. The civil war in Syria has provided the training and experience they need to wage their war on the world. And perhaps most worrisome their ranks are filled with hundreds of jihadists who hold valid passports from the UK, USA, and Western European countries. They will return all too soon to bring their horrific form of terror to the West. I rarely find myself in agreement with Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, but his comments on ISIL yesterday were instructive:

"This is beyond anything that we've seen...ISIL is as sophisticated and well-funded as any group that we have seen. They marry ideology, a sophistication of strategic and tactical military prowess. They are tremendously well-funded....So we must prepare for everything. And the only way you do that is that you take a cold, steely, hard look at it ... and get ready."

Get ready, indeed. Secretary Hagel was joined by chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey, who added, "This is an organization that has an apocalyptic, end-of-days strategic vision and which will eventually have to be defeated."

About our absent strategy for dealing with and defeating ISIL, the secretary and the general also said some remarkably inane things, but at least they seem to appreciate the nature of the threat. Perhaps in time they will be able to convince the president to address it.

All of this brought to mind what Christopher Dawson wrote, describing the barbarian invasions suffered by the late Roman Empire:

"To pagan and Christian alike it seemed the end of all things -- in St. Jerome's words, 'the light of the world was put out and the head of the Roman Empire was cut off'...It is a tendency of modern historians to minimize the importance of the invasions, but it is difficult to exaggerate the horror and suffering which they involved. It was not war as we understand it, but brigandage on a vast scale exercised upon an unwarlike and almost defenseless population. It meant the sack of cities, the massacre and enslavement of the population and the devastation of the open country. In Macedonia the Roman envoys to Attila in 448 found the once populous city of Naissus empty save for the dead. In Afrida, if a city refused to surrender, the Vandals would drive their captives up to the walls and slaughter them in masses so that the stench of their corpses should render the defenses untenable." [Christopher Dawson, Medieval Essays, p. 50]

Dawson goes on to quote St. Jerome who wrote the following early in the 5th century when the barbarian attacks were just beginning:

"The mind shudders when dwelling on the ruin of our day. For twenty years and more, Roman blood has been flowing ceaselessly over the broad countries between Constantinople and the Julian Alps, where the Goths, the Huns and the Vandals spread ruin and death...How many Roman nobles have been their prey! How many matrons and maidens have fallen victim to their lust! Bishops live in prison, priests and clerics fall by the sword, churches are plundered, Christ's altars are turned into feeding-troughs, the remains of the martyrs are thrown out of their coffins. On every side sorrow, on every side lamentation, everywhere the image of death."

Although it's highly unlikely we in the United States will face the kind of devastating attacks suffered by the 5th-century Romans, others throughout the world are already experiencing exactly that. I expect it will continue to spread.

The early medieval world survived the attacks of the barbarians and ended up converting them to Christianity. Of course those early Christians were a people of faith. May our faith be as strong.

Chaos Rising

Here I am, just a few weeks shy of my 70th birthday, and I can't recall a time in my life when both the nation and the world seemed to be moving so rapidly toward the brink of total chaos. One can only marvel at those in the affluent, self-absorbed West who bury their heads in the sand believing all is right in the world.

You'll quickly discover what I mean if you spend a morning or afternoon watching the business shows on CNBC or Fox Business Channel. The denizens of these networks, whether bulls, bears, or creatures in-between, distill everything down to economics. Money and high finance rule. Each apparently believes that, at its core, every problem is related to the economy. Party affiliation or political labels seem to matter little. Their solutions certainly vary, from the libertarian's "anything goes" approach that borders on anarchy to the don't-call-me-a-socialist's "turn it all over to the government" approach that leads only to Orwell's Big Brother. And as they talk, and predict, and cheer and jeer, the stock ticker runs across the bottom of the screen, a constant reminder of the current state of these tiny pieces of the economy. For those worried about the condition of their 401Ks, or who hope their penny stocks will soar into Apple territory, I suppose it's all very addictive. The viewer comes to believe that ultimately  the shape of the future will be determined by the Dow Jones Average.

In truth, the future of civilization will be determined by the battles being waged between ideology and religion, between the many brands of totalitarianism and freedom, between a horrific brand of Islam and civilization itself, between those who worship man as a god and those who worship a Man as God. If you were to ask an al-Qaeda leader or an ISIL follower (or ISIS or whatever these barbarians call themselves today) why they wage war against the West, I'm pretty sure the answer wouldn't focus on economics or NASDAQ futures. They know we are in the midst of a global war, a spiritual war that most people in Western Europe and the U.S. blithely ignore. 

Western elitists, the descendants of a Christendom that no longer exists, are apparently oblivious to the ramifications of what's taking place in the world's unenlightened corners. They don't take the idea of spiritual warfare seriously because they don't take the idea of God seriously. In their enlightened progressivism they believe that society, especially their society, is moving unrelentingly forward. And they believe this despite the global barbarism of the past hundred years. I suspect such thinking often arises from a subtle form of racism that views events in the so-called Third World and the Southern Hemisphere as unimportant or certainly far less important than what happens in the developed world. At best it's the product of a myopic parochialism that prevents one from seeing beyond its self-defined borders. And for some it stems from simple ignorance, abetted by the political correctness that controls much of what passes for education these days.

And yet the war rages and continues to expand. One thing is certain: unlike many in the developed West, the people of Africa and the Middle East know they are in a war zone. Although the Middle East will always be the primary battleground, Africa might eventually rival the Middle East because Christianity on that continent has experienced such remarkable growth. This growth is perceived as a real threat by those who would destroy Christianity. Based on the common, erroneous belief that Christianity, and more specifically Catholicism, is in decline, few Westerners, including Western Christians, are aware of the extent of this growth. For example, how many know that Catholics in sub-Sahara Africa increased from 2 million in 1900 to over 130 million in 2000? -- a remarkable growth rate of over 4% annually. Or that Gallup estimates the total number of African Catholics today at over 200 million? The fact that the growth of the Catholic Church in Africa has outpaced the growth of the continent's overall population is a sign of some very healthy evangelization. 

According to recent study by CESNUR (The Center for the Study of New Religions), among African countries, 31 have Christian majorities, 21 have Muslim majorities and 6 have populations which adhere mostly to traditional African religions. In 1900 Christians in Africa totalled ten million; in 2012 this number reached five hundred million. In 1900 only 2% of Christians in the world were African; today, this figure has risen to 20%. In ten years time Africa will be the largest continental bloc within Christianity, outdoing Europe and the Americas. “This data is still not widely known," stated sociologist Massimo Introvigne, CESNUR’s founder, "but they have a profound historical, cultural and political significance. There are now more practicing Christians in Africa than in Europe. In the long run, this will not only change Africa but Christianity as well, as John Paul II had intuited..."

“Of course, not everyone is happy about this development,” Introvigne added. The sociologist claimed that this growth in the number of Christians across the African continent is likely behind many of the attacks on Christians. “Some Islamic ultra-fundamentalists consider it scandalous that there are more Christians than Muslims in Africa and proceed to persecute and kill Christians in countries such as Nigeria, Mali, Somalia and Kenya. The way the ultra-fundamentalists see it, today the battle which will determine whether the world will be Muslim or Christian is being fought in Africa. And that Islam is losing. This is why they are responding with bombs.” In Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood's primary target has been Christians and Christian churches. The same is true of Boko Haram in Nigeria. And the Islamists who carried the Nairobi mall massacre made a point of singling out Christians.

This desire to destroy Christianity isn't restricted to Africa. It's even more apparent in the Middle East. We've heard a lot of talk out of Iraq recently about the potential "genocide" of the Yazidi people by ISIL. And what is happening to that people is certainly horrendous. But how many Westerners realize what's happening to the larger Christian community in Iraq? Indeed, how many know what's been happening to Christians throughout the world, particularly in Muslim-majority countries? Christians in Pakistan and Iran are persecuted, imprisoned and murdered simply because of their beliefs. In Iraq the Islamist jihadists of ISIL are beheading young Christian children and displaying their severed heads on pikes. They are crucifying Christians and staging mass executions of anyone who resists converting to their vicious form of Islam. As a result Christians are fleeing the Middle East and their once-thriving communities have all but disappeared.

About all this our nation has done little, and said even less. Indeed, our selective concern seems almost arbitrary. In 2011, we joined the British and the French and bombed Libya's Gaddafi regime out of existence. Ironically, it's likely more Libyan civilians have died since Gaddafi's overthrow than before. And as the power of the Islamists has increased in that country, so too has the persecution and exodus of Libyan Christians.

Only a year later, when confronted by a far worse situation in Syria, we did virtually nothing, other than draw some imaginary red lines in the sand. The result has been the deaths of tens of thousands of Syrian civilians and the growth of ISIL into a formidable military force. And now, with half of Iraq in the hands of ISIL, we limit our response to humanitarian assistance and highly selective air strikes that have only driven ISIL underground where they will resort to classic insurgency tactics. I suspect ISIL, flush with cash and modern weaponry, will only grow stronger. And in the meantime the Christians of Syria and Iraq are being slaughtered by the jihadists. 

After Mass yesterday morning a parishioner asked me, "Are we in the end times? Do you think Jesus will come soon?" I told her I had no idea. Indeed, Our Lord made a point of reminding us that no one knows when the end will come. But He also told us not to ignore the signs. Read Matthew, Chapter 24, and pray for our world, for yourself, and for those you love. Pray that in the midst of the chaos, we will remain true to Jesus Christ and His One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.

I conclude with the words of Pope Benedict XVI:

"...from the beginning the Church lives in prayerful waiting for her Lord, scrutinizing the signs of the times and putting the faithful on guard against recurring messiahs, who from time to time announce the world's end is imminent. In reality, history must run its course, which brings with it also human dramas and natural calamities. In it a design of salvation is developed that Christ has already brought to fulfillment in his incarnation, death, and resurrection. The Church continues to proclaim this mystery and to announce and accomplish it with her preaching, celebration of the sacraments, and witness of charity." [The Joy of Knowing Christ, p. 115]