Peter Quilty, a priest of the Townsville Diocese has just finished a three month stay at Tantur in Jerusalem, and has been entertaining and enlightening us with his weekly emails. We hope you enjoy them too - and consider all that he has to say about the country and its trials and tribulations.

24.01.2005

Just waiting for a class to start.

Dear Friends all over,

Freezing cold here the last couple of days - up on Mt Hermon, about 110Ks north, the ski fields have opened and the wind is coming straight off them to us!!

Last week has been as good as ever; seeing and learning, visiting Bethlehem, the City of David and the Old City, and getting new perspectives from all different angles - literally. This was especially so when we went onto the roofs of the houses in the Old City to look out at the scene below and catch some ideas of what might have been and what used to have been. It was fascinating.

However, I'm going to have to leave off as our lecturer is about to start........!

More later, see you soon or the like.

All the best,

Peter Q.

8.02.2005

Dear Friends all over,

Well, it's been sleeting just about all day long (Sunday) and I've not gone out. At least the rain has been most welcome to all over here as this is the wet season for them, and it does mean that the reservoirs and the river ( Jordan ) will have a better flow which will in turn, augment the Sea of Galilee . As that is where they draw their water everyone will be better. It will also enable the Palestinians to get water more of the time, as they sometimes have their water closed off whenever the settlements run short for their swimming pools and heated spas and the like.

It's a different world here....??? Just grab the water from the poor. What do you mean 'they don't have any'? So what, just use whatever is there. The injustices continue - and the bitterness.

Yesterday (Saturday) evening I had the experience of waiting, because of the checkpoints. Planning on going to Bethlehem Uni for Mass, with the De La Salle brothers there and Br Cyril had offered to do a pickup. He left the Uni at 5pm to come and pick two of us up - only about 1 or

2 kms – and he arrived at 6.10pm, having waited at the point for an hour. On the way back there it was straight through, but one can never tell......

Great to be over at the Uni. There are 12 or 13 brothers in the community, and Br Vincent, the current President of the Uni knows Br Ambrose Payne back at Oak Hill in Sydney . It would be great to get Vincent to visit Australia and tell the story of the people over here, as well as the special work of the Uni in trying to give Palestinian students (Muslim and Christian) the opportunity of tertiary education, so that they are able to help their own people in the struggle for justice and peace. It would be really good if our Knights of the Holy Sepulchre could sponsor him as he is himself a Knight. Also met Fr Tom Fitzpatrick SJ, Rector of the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Jerusalem, and local superior here, who has in his community Cardinal Carlo Martini, the retired Archbishop of Milan, still under 80 so still eligible to be elected Pope - we are hoping to get both of them to a meal here on day soon.

Now, how about the week just gone?

Well, again we have done and seen so much, and fortunately the rain held off for us on a couple of trips that we did during the week.

I am not sure if I mentioned the Negev (down south) where we went last Monday? Like so much over here, it is putting the whole biblical picture into perspective, just as some of you may have experienced at Waterloo, or on the Western Front, or the Pass of Thermopylae, or some other famous and historic landmark. It all comes so alive when you're there, and it also helps to understand the local sense that the past is the here and now! It's a little bit more than being present for a Grand Final at the MCG, or the Grand Prix on the Gold Coast. Makes for complex diplomacy that the West has not even begun to grasp, and God knows what Condolezza Rice will try to make of it when she comes to visit here - no better than George W for sure!!

Tuesday it began to rain a bit and we began some lecture material on Christian - Muslim religions and relations. More complexities when one is living in the heartland of these peoples, but still so good.

Wednesday was back with Debbie Weismann, our Orthodox Jewish lady feminist-pacifist- professor, and boy, can't she stir up her Jewish rabbinical schools and the rabbis who can be so 'anti' all that Debbie stands for - but she has a brilliant mind, and is so open-minded. She is arranging for us to visit her synagogue, and to have a shabbat meal with the families of the community who have all agreed to it.

The afternoon was cold and clearing sometimes, so it was time for a bit of walking but only in the local area and down to the local shops - it's amazing where these shops are found - we expect awnings and special parking and all that sort of thing, whereas here there is a steel shutter folded back and the whole frontage is right on the pathway, or roadway, and there is the shop! And always welcoming even if you are not buying. But I bought a few things and then went home. Always when we go out we have our passport and visa - I'd made an awful mistake on the Monday and forgot mine, but thank God we didn't go through any checkpoints - I'm very careful now.

Thursday was another trip and this time to the Dead Sea . Three places were on our list to visit: Massada, En Gedi, and Qumran (Dead Sea Scrolls).

Massada is at the end of the top half of the Dead Sea , about 100 kms from here, and is a plateau fortress-palace going back maybe 3000 years to an ancient temple, but certainly to the time just before Herod the Great over 200 years ago. It is 400mtrs high straight up from the plain below, and the Dead Sea is 380mtrs below sea level, so the top of the plateau is a few feet above sea level, but why Herod built his palace-fort up here I'm blowed if I know. He did have plenty of slave labour as that would be the only way he could get it built - no freeman in his right mind would even come down here!!!! We got to the top in a cable car - 40 to a compartment and you all stand - don't rock the boat!! But we made it. The cable car is quite an achievement and many students come down here for studies - there are some who climb the "Snake Path", which winds back and forth, to the top. The site is remarkable for its ruins and size: about 650mtrs in length, and 300mtrs in width and the northern face has two other palaces cut into the rocks, smaller of course, and lower down the face from the top. I managed to keep away from the outside fences!! The Romans, when they conquered it in the Bar-Kochba revolt (about 120AD), built an enormous ramp up the western side and finally got into the fortress to find that all inside were dead. Apparently some monks came along centuries later and stayed there for some time, probably till their food ran out or the rope broke that carried it up to them and they decided to leave. But it is a remarkable place that features in New Testament times. And the mountains to the west are part of the Judean Desert that goes back to the south of Jerusalem .

From here we went some 20kms north, still right on the Dead Sea , to our lunch spot, En Gedi, “The Spring”. There are fresh water springs here, that have been flowing since ancient times and allow for date farms and other vegetation along this area. A couple of kibbutzes are here, 'settlers' in the Palestinian lands, who are protected by the army and their own weapons...... All the area is national park, but that is not quite the same as our National Parks. St udy of the places is done, but there is a lot still to be done on environmental stuff e.g. the incredible run-off that is created by the settlements further inland, that all runs down now in flash floods and erodes into the Dead Sea , that used to soak into the land where it would be good for agriculture. Despite the Israelis being world leaders in water harvesting, they are environmental pirates in many ways when it comes to looking after their own; and the developers are making a fortune as they purchase the land for the "settlement" and then sell it back to the settlers - at greatly inflated prices!

From here, we went to Qumran where a couple of our intrepid travellers went for a swim, (I'd been swimming here in '99 and had no desire to go again!). This is another lower hilltop area that goes back thousands of years and is where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. There are now lots of theories about the area as more discoveries are being made and these change the detail of the earliest uses that seem apparent here. One thing is certain though and that is that the Scrolls were found here and there are probably more in other caves that are yet to be explored - so it is archaeology in action. The place is very close to the top end (northern) of the Dead Sea and from here we had god trip home.

It had been a perfect day down there as the weather was fine and mild, particularly as we were almost 1300mtrs lower down there(just about 400mtrs below sea level) than at home, so it was back to a very cold evening. Our meal as always warmed us up.

Friday and yesterday back to lectures and very cold, wet weather, sleet a lot of the time, so no walking and plenty of time to read and try to catch up on the studies.

Well, that's about all for this epistle - as it's time for some more study - horizontal type!!

Hope you're all well - and getting plenty of rain for the wet season for those in that area.

With Condolezza Rice visiting at the moment, security has stepped up, but it's not having any effect here - just that there are more soldiers round in the city and hotels and the like- and it actually seems that there may be an easing of the burdens on the Palestinians soon, if the US will start to lean on Israel - about time too, if only they'd stop listening to all the crap that the Murdoch-inspired press keeps regurgitating from the ultra-right. But enough of my politicking.

At the moment our weather looks like snowing....... so plenty of time to read, and Debbie has given us more recommended reading!!!!! I'll need to be more selective in buying or I'll be 'weighed-out' on any aircraft Please keep up a prayer or two for the Palestinians, and for peace over here.

God bless and best wishes.

Regards to you all for now,

Peter.