Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, June/July 2021, pp. 33-34
Christianity and the Middle East
By Rev. Alex Awad
“What do you say to the people who believe that religion is behind much of the turmoil in the Middle East?”
I was a speaker at the April 2021 “End U.S. Support for Israeli Apartheid?” conference and this was the final question asked by an attendee. I gave a quick and short reply since my time was almost up. However, I pondered the question in the days after the conference and it occurred to me that even a thick book focused solely on this subject might fail to answer this question adequately. What I propose to do, in this short exposé, is to reflect on the negative and positive influences of religion that I experienced growing up in Palestine.
I was born in Jerusalem where followers of the three major monotheistic religions have lived—and unfortunately, fought—together for centuries. There is a history of bloody religious conflicts in Jerusalem dating back thousands of years. The city was conquered and destroyed more than 20 times and empire and religion were the driving forces behind many of these conquests.
Two years after I was born, Jerusalem was invaded by Zionists who were partly inspired by their Jewish identity, faith and history and partly by their colonial ambitions. The invasion resulted in the first Arab-Israeli war. My father was shot and killed, and I became a refugee along with my family. Attacks on my homeland continue to be carried out by secular Zionist leaders, religious Zionist leaders, and Christian Zionist leaders. All three groups have used religion to validate the theft of Palestine. All three have used passages from the Bible to justify their crimes.
The invasion of my homeland clearly illustrates how religion has been and continues to be used to create turmoil and tension between people. Zionists are not alone in using religion to achieve their political goals. The history of Christianity is littered with massacres, genocides and atrocities against Jews, Muslims and others. Muslims can also look at the history of Islam and realize that they too initiated violent wars and massacres against Jews and Christians, under the pretext of defending God and religion. Scanning through the history of the three monotheistic religions, I could not help but affirm to the above-mentioned questioner, “Yes, no doubt! Religion has indeed been a big part of the problem.” However, this is not the full story and cannot be the stand-alone answer to the question.
After we became refugees, my mother, who now had to work to feed and shelter seven children on her own, placed us in boarding schools. One of my sisters and I were placed in Dar Al-Tifl Al-Arabi, a school which was established in 1948 by a Muslim philanthropist by the name of Hind al Husseini. Other siblings attended Dar el Awlad, which was also established in 1948 by a Christian philanthropist, Katy Antonius, wife of the famous author George Habib Antonius, who in 1938 wrote, The Arab Awakening. Both women were inspired by their faith in God to care for orphans of the first Arab- Israeli war. My remaining siblings ended up attending Greek Orthodox, Anglican, Armenian and Lutheran schools. All these boarding schools and orphanages accepted both Muslim and Christian children and treated them with equality while providing them with quality education. These boarding schools could not have existed or survived without the support of Islamic and Christian individuals and organizations.
When I was a child in boarding school, the most exciting Christmas gift that I received was a towel! It turned out that wrapped inside the towel were a few surprises, such as a little toy car, a bar of soap, a tube of toothpaste with a toothbrush, a puzzle and other small but exciting items. At that time, I had no idea where these gifts came from. When I became the principal of Hope Secondary School near Bethlehem many years later, I learned that these gifts had been assembled and sent by Mennonite farmers who lived in the U.S. and in Canada. In addition, beautiful, artistic and comfortable quilts, which were sewn and contributed by Mennonites, Quakers, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists and other Christians, gave warmth and security to thousands of refugee girls and boys.
As the principal of Hope Secondary School, which was established by the Mennonites, I also learned that the school depended on the aid it received from Christian organizations such as World Vision, Mennonite Central Committee, Catholic Relief Services, Bible Lands Society, Christian Aid and others. Besides that, when I was a child growing up in Jerusalem, most schools and hospitals were largely funded by Christians but also by various Islamic charities.
Military occupation causes poverty, and poverty causes people to seek help for their families. When I served at Bethlehem Bible College, people would come to the college and ask for food and medicine. My brother Bishara, who was the director of the college, created a special fund he used to meet emergency needs of both Muslim and Christian families. The number of those who knocked at our college’s door increased, so we eventually started the Shepherd Society.
These schools could not have survived without the support of religious organizations.
The Shepherd Society provided aid to thousands in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. All the funds we distributed to the needy came from Christian organizations around the world. They gave generously without any demands on us as an organization or any demands on the recipients.
When the leaders of the college heard about the conditions of Iraqi and Syrian refugees in the Jordanian cities of Amman and Mafraq, we started sending teams of students with money and supplies to minister to the refugees there. In one of my visits to Mafraq, with one of the teams, I was astonished at the number of Christian charities that had also arrived in Mafraq to aid the refugees. Muslim charities were there too, and Messianic Jewish congregations in Israel made generous contributions to help Iraqi and Syrian refugees.
The examples I use above aim at illustrating the “other” face of religion, which has concurrently played out as a theme throughout my life. One of the more violent courses that I taught at college was Christian History. I kept telling my bewildered students that what they discover through the study of Christianity does not reveal the whole story. Daily, millions of acts of kindness are carried out in the name of Christ to feed the hungry, heal the sick or provide an education to the underprivileged, and most of these acts do not get reported in major media outlets and do not fill chapters in history books. However, when a preacher is caught committing a heinous crime, his or her wrongdoing makes it on air and in print for all to see. With only a few exceptions, church history is a focus on the ugly acts of political and religious leaders, who acted contrary to the teachings of their respective religions.
Religion is not the problem but rather the abuse of religion. Ironically, according to the Gospels, it was not the harlots, thieves and drunkards who conspired to crucify Jesus but rather it was the religious leaders who were using their status and political power to oppress the poor and cling to a procedural form of religion.
There are folks today who use religion to inflict pain on others and there are folks who are inspired by their religions to ease the pain of humanity. Which of the two will triumph in having the greatest impact on humanity? The popular parable by an unknown author may help provide the answer:
An old Cherokee Indian chief was teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he told the young boy, “a fight between two wolves. The Dark one is evil—he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.” He continued, “The Light wolf is good—he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you grandson…and inside of every other person on the face of this earth.” The grandson pondered this for a moment and then asked, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?” The old Cherokee smiled and simply said, “The one you feed.”
The Dark Wolf of religion that is within us, will savagely inflict pain on humanity if we continue to feed it a diet of greed, racism, xenophobia, and violence. But we can choose to feed and nourish the Light Wolf of religion—which is also within us—with acts of love, mercy, truth, faith and compassion. Will religion continue to fan the flame of hate and violence in the Middle East? That depends on us!
Rev. Dr. Alex Awad is a retired United Methodist Missionary. He and his wife, Brenda, served in Jerusalem and in Bethlehem for more than 25 years. Rev. Awad served as pastor of East Jerusalem Baptist Church, dean of students at Bethlehem Bible College, and director of the Shepherd Society. Awad has written two books, Through the Eyes of the Victims and Palestinian Memories. Rev. Awad is a member of the Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace (PCAP).
