A Future with Amahl – Bishop Hope Morgan Ward

(The following blog post was written by Bishop Hope Morgan Ward during a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with 10 other ecumenical female bishops.  Ward is the presiding Bishop of the Mississippi Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church and serves as the President of the JustPeace Board of Directors  For more information about the pilgrimage, click here).  

Amahl is the Arabic word for “hope.”   As we look toward a Future with Hope, a remarkable pilgrimage is unfolding in the place Jesus knew and loved.  The first experiences have been in the Galilee — the areas of his birth and childhood and 80% of his ministry.

The pilgrimage is remarkable in several ways:  the pilgrims are 10 women bishops from the African Methodist Episcopal, Christian Methodist Episcopal, Episcopal, and United Methodist Churches.  The pilgrimage links us with Arab Palestinian Christians, “a minority within a minority” in the country of Israel, as well as Jews and Muslims.  The pilgrimage focuses on the leadership of women in empowering women, developing economic opportunities for women, creating a compassionate and just future for children and families, and weaving peaceful communities.

We have visited with remarkable leaders, women and men who are persistent and persevering in the way of peace, reaching from both sides of the great divide between the dominant Jewish communities and the minority Arab communities.  Palestinian and Jewish women are working together, creating economic opportunity in the production and selling of baskets, honey, olive oil, and soap.  They are not learning a new way of life together; rather, as Father Elias Chacour observes, they are living as they lived side by side 60 years ago

“We want you to know that there is a community in Israel that believes in a shared future.”  This observation of a young woman leader has been echoed in our first two days here.

In story after story, we have heard faith journeys from people who are not looking for headlines but who are working in humble places.  They live a vibrant witness of faith.  A woman rabbi chooses to shop on the Palestinian village rather than drive farther as other Jews do to shop in a Jewish area.  Palestinian and Jewish women work together to open a cooperative.  Palestinian Christians educated in the United States return to Nazareth in faithful response to God’s call to participate as leaders in the hope for peace.

The reality is powerful:  we are among the “living stones,” to use the words of Father Chacour.

Beautiful lives inspire even more than beautiful churches.