MIDDLE EAST:There may soon be no Christians left in Bethlehem due to the political situation there, its parish priest has said. People in the town were "living under extraordinarily difficult circumstances", Fr Samuel Fahim, parish priest at the Church of the Nativity has said.
In a letter to The Irish Times, he continued that the "once bustling cultural and spiritual centre" had been turned into "an isolated town". The ongoing construction of a wall "around the churches, mosques, villages and refugee camps of the Bethlehem district is suffocating the social and economic life of people here.Regarding the spiritual life, the difficulties of living here for some has caused a crises in their faith," he continued.
This "strangulation" of Bethlehem was most deeply felt by its Christians, he said. "We recall the times when the Christian population of Bethlehem stood at 70 per cent of the total population. Now, it stands at around 30 per cent, with only 40,000 Christians left in the Bethlehem district. Since the year 2000 alone, more than 400 Christian families have left the area."
"The fear is that the birthplace of Jesus, home of the oldest Christian church and the oldest Christian communities in the world, will have nothing left of its history other than the cold stones of empty churches within a few generations," he added.
The Catholic Patriarch of Jerusalem, Michel Sabbah, "has consistently expressed his fear that the "churches of the Holy Land will become museums," he said,adding that now there were "more Palestinian Christians in Sydney, Australia than in Jerusalem and more Christian Palestinians in North America than there are in the Holy Land."
He recalled that last June, on a visit to Dublin to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands, Mr Sabbah reminded his Irish audiences that "all peoples are equal in dignity. Hence independence and security are needed for all".
Fr Fahim extended "a special invitation to Irish pilgrims to come and bear witness to the still living churches of the Holy Land. We invite those same pilgrims to spend time in this little town and to celebrate Mass with local Catholics who are so badly in need of solidarity and peace." Such visits would also "help arrest the decline and the suffering of Bethlehem," he said.