Southampton PSC: Peace Protest for Palestine

Imagine we are living in a parallel universe. 75 years ago, Britain was defeated in the 2nd World War.  The RAF lost the Battle of Britain. D Day was a disaster. Britain was invaded and then colonised. The majority fled the country and cannot return. Those who survived have moved to the Southampton-Portsmouth Strip. Nearly 3 million people live as refugees in what is the world’s largest open prison, 25 miles long, 5 miles wide. The M27 is a militarised separation barrier. The coastline is patrolled. The ports are derelict. No one can leave. There is no escape. Imports and exports are heavily restricted. We depend on UN aid to survive.  

Our democratically elected civil government has been designated a terrorist organisation. Three months ago, it got much worse. Armed resistance fighters broke out of our enclave. In retaliation, for the last 100 days, Southampton, Fareham, Gosport and Portsmouth have been sieged, invaded and bombed. Day and night. As a result, there are tens of thousands of dead and wounded. 80% of homes have been destroyed or are uninhabitable. The Civic Hall has been demolished. Portsmouth, Solent and Southampton Universities have all been flattened.  The University Hospital, Royal South Hampshire and Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth have been severely damaged and are out of operation. Southampton airport is unusable. Most churches and mosques, shops, schools and community centres have been demolished or are unusable. Mass burials are taking place daily on Southampton Common.

And then, just when we thought it could not get any worse, two million people have been forced to move to a so-called ‘safe zone’ along the Weston Shore, Netley and in Royal Victoria Park. We are living in the open air, in makeshift tents. There is little or no food, no water or electricity. There is a communication blackout. The UN are only allowed to bring in a fraction of the supplies we need to survive. Medical staff are performing operations without anaesthetics. With no sanitation, communicable diseases are rampant. diarrhoea cases surged 66 percent among children. Meningitis, chickenpox, jaundice also reported. Half a million people are literally starving.

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Challenging Apartheid and Religious Extremism: Sabeel Jerusalem Conference and Webinars

Conference Purpose Statement: 
After ignoring 75 years of Israeli settler-colonial violence, since the 7th of October last year, the world has been shocked into taking notice of the genocide occurring against Palestinians in Gaza. With the aim of speaking into these tragedies, the 2024 Sabeel International Conference will challenge apartheid and religious extremism through a liberationist approach to theology by ecumenical and interfaith collaboration. Thought leaders representing the Abrahamic faiths will guide participants in reflecting on the current situation and exploring ecumenical, interfaith, non-violent avenues for fostering peace and justice in Palestine and Israel. 

Webinars: Sabeel has organized five webinars, each at 8pm Jerusalem time, from January to May. These webinars, facilitated by distinguished academics and activists, serve as a prelude to the conference by introducing themes and topics that will be explored in depth in November.

Register for the webinars here

Wednesday 31st January: An Introduction to Religious Extremism
This webinar will introduce religious extremism and outline the November conference.

Wednesday 28th February: Zionism and Antisemitism
How the term antisemitism has been weaponised and an examination of the relationship between Zionism, apartheid, and religious extremism in Judaism. 

Wednesday 27th March: Islam and Islamophobia
Define Islamophobia, challenge stereotypes and prejudice toward Muslims, and examine how Islamophobia has been exploited to silence criticism of Israel.

Wednesday 24th April: Christophobia and the Persecution of Christians
A discussion on the persecution of Christians and how Christian Zionism exacerbates tensions for Palestinian Christians. 

Wednesday 29th May: A Summary on Religious Extremism
A summary of the series and information about the November conference including the schedule and how to maximize your participation.

Principles: The principles guiding this conference include facilitating constructive interfaith dialogue, promoting human rights and justice in Palestine and Israel, challenging misinterpretations of religious texts contributing to extremism, empowering grassroots activism and advocacy, and strengthening collaborative networks. The Sabeel conference aims to create a platform for dialogue across faiths to address the root causes of extremism and advance human rights in Palestine.

Register for the webinars here

What is the Relationship between Israel and the Church? Seven Biblical Answers (Dutch Translation)

We are pleased to provide a Dutch translation of the four page leaflet summarising my book Zion’s Christian Soldiers. You may also download a 7 page version which is less compact.

The leaflet has now been translated into:

Arabic
Chinese
German
Dutch
Korean

English

Discovering my Purpose in Life (John 1)

When you were a child, who or what did you want to be when you grew up? As a child, I dreaded the Christmas visits to aunts and uncles. Every year they would ask me the same question: “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  I hadn’t a clue. In many societies, you are expected to join the family trade or you may become an apprentice to a master craftsman. That’s how my grandfather Lewis learnt his trade. My great-grandmother paid a local carpenter to take Lewis on as a young boy and teach him carpentry skills. I still have his articles of indenture. My grandfather became his pupil, a learner. Then when he too became a master craftsman, he took on my father who became his disciple. I broke the family tradition although I’m pretty good at putting Ikea furniture together.  The greatest tragedy in life is not death, but life without meaning, without purpose. Many people go through life without ever discovering God’s purpose for their lives. We are not an accident. We were created for a purpose. We were made to have meaning. 

In his book, The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren says “Without God, life has no purpose, and without purpose, life has no meaning. Without meaning, life has no significance…” In our Gospel reading we learn about God’s purposes, not just the first disciples, but for us too.  The context for their meeting with Jesus begins in verse 35.

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Four Kings and a Joker: Jesus, Herod & the Magi (Matthew 2)

Despite criticism of their alleged involvement, virtually everyone on both sides of the Atlantic, including the US President, Joe Biden and the British Monarch King Charles, have been celebrating the visit of an Iranian delegation to Palestine. In the Epiphany story, we remember how a group of Iranians visited Palestine carrying funding for an opposition figure the authorities wanted dead. Then the Iranians evaded the authorities, ignoring the correct exit procedures and fled the country. Of course, King Charles, the Prime Minister and US President have not been celebrating contemporary Iranian involvement, but the historic visit of a past Iranian delegation – the Magi (the ‘Wise Men’ or ‘Kings’) who came to Bethlehem bringing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh for Jesus. It is ironic that without Iran and Iranian involvement, we would not have exchanged gifts on Christmas Day! 

The passage before us today is a study in contrasts. The contrast between religious hypocrisy and spiritual integrity. Between the religious hypocrisy of Herod and the Priests, and the spiritual integrity of the Magi. How can we distinguish one from the other? By their response to God’s revelation in nature, but above all His self revelation in the Scriptures. For the scriptures demand a response, not passive acquiescence nor mere lip service, but submission. In this passage we are going to consider the Kings Hypocrisy, the Scripture’s Testimony, and the Magi’s Integrity.

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Peacemakers: Celebrating 2023 and Vision 2024

If you are like me they you probably find January a challenging month. After the highs of the Christmas season, the short-lived New Year resolutions, long dark nights, and typically cold weather, we can easily become discouraged or demotivated. 

In my former parish, just after Christmas I would invite the whole church family to reflect upon the previous year and identify their personal ministry highlights. Having collated their answers, we gave a copy to every church member encouraging them to keep it in their bibles and use it in their daily prayers, giving thanks for God’s abundant blessings in the year that had gone. Each January we found this really strengthened our faith and raised our expectations of what the Lord could accomplish in and through us during the year ahead. 

I have done the same in what follows, highlighting an event or initiative for each month of 2023. I have also appended news of two exciting new initiaitves in 2024. Thank you for making this all possible, through your prayers and support. We look forward to partnering with you in the year ahead. 

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All Creatures of our God and King: Psalm 148

The Psalms have a unique place in scripture. They have been likened to a hymn book. But not just any old hymnbook. Whether we feel like worship or not, as we begin to recite the verses of the psalms, something begins to happen in our hearts. It is as if the saying of the words draws us in to praise. John Piper says, “Thanksgiving with the mouth stirs up thankfulness in the heart.”[1]

I don’t know about you, but I cannot read more than a few verses of Psalm 148 without wanting to sing the beautiful hymn “All Creatures of our God and King”. It was written by William Henry Draper, based on a poem by Francis of Assisi, and set to a tune composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams.  But as we sing, or say, the words of this psalm, I also confess that I smile at the absurd idea that somehow we human beings can instruct the angels, the sun and moon, the weather, the mountains, the seas, reptiles, birds and animals, to praise God. Why? Because the scriptures tell us this is something which they already do, naturally and instinctively, all the time. [2]  

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Christ in the Rubble: A Liturgy of Lament

The Revd Dr Munther Isaac, is the vicar of the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church in Bethlehem. Munther delivered a prophetic message during the Christ in the Rubble Liturgy of Lament service today. It was a powerful message challenging Western Churches to demonstrate solidarity with the suffering church in Palestine and repudiate the genocide occurring in Gaza, because silence is complicity.

View the video here
Read Munther’s text below:

Christ in the Rubble
A Liturgy of Lament

“We are angry…
We are broken…
This should have been a time of joy; instead, we are mourning. We are fearful.

20,000 killed. Thousands under the rubble still. Close to 9,000 children killed in the most brutal ways. Day after day after day. 1.9 million displaced! Hundreds of thousands of homes destroyed. Gaza as we know it no longer exists. This is an annihilation. A genocide.

The world is watching; Churches are watching. Gazans are sending live images of their own execution. Maybe the world cares? But it goes on…

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