Thurs., June 21
Good afternoon friends and family! Today we dove deeper into our spiritual journey. We started out on the The Palm Sunday Road. We sang Hosanna on the way down. After maybe a 5 min walk we stopped at the church of Dominus Flevit. The church is on the Mount of Olives and faces the old city of Jerusalem. This is the site where Jesus wept for Jerusalem. (Lk 21:5-8) To this day the temple has not been rebuilt. The church is in the shape of a tear. For me this place just brought to reality how many times God tries to share himself with us and we just do not listen over and over again.
We also saw some old Jewish graves from the time of King Solomon. Our tour guide is such a well of knowledge because he is also an archeologist. He was sharing with us that they found with all the married Jewish many small glass containing the tears of their wife. Women, once they reached puberty would collect their tears in these containers. When they married they would present them to their husbands as a symbol that they were giving their joys and their sorrows to them, everything and then were buried along with their husbands as well. This is important because if you remember, Mary washed the feet of Christ with her tears. In this instance, instead of giving her tears to Jesus as a romantic symbol, rather she used them, on the dirtiest part of the body (feet) in a way of total gift of self. Our bible is so rich! (It is so important to understand the context and the practices of the times!)
We continued down the path and stopped at a lookout point of Jerusalem. Amazing to see the same city that Jesus looked upon the week before he was to be crucified.
I rode a camel!
We then had mass at in the Garden of Gethsemane called the Basilica of Agony. The mosaics of the wall depict the night in the Garden and the betrayal. Before the altar in the center of the church is the rock agony that Jesus wept upon. This was the most moving mass for me yet. Throughout the mass, the thought that God placed in my mind was, where was Mary during this time? I am sure she felt in her heart that her baby was suffering. And yet our Blessed Mother took on that same suffering in silence.
After mass we went to the well of Mary on which has was mosque built. This is the site of the Annunciation. The Muslim faith respects Mary and also believes in her virginity.
We traveled to the Ascension chapel, the site believed to be where Christ ascended which is a tiny oval tower about as big as the living room. It is also cared for by the Muslims and is next to the mosque. Christians are allowed to visit and have mass only on Ascension Sunday. The Muslims also believed in the resurrection of Jesus, just not in His death. (or His divinity) Interesting enough, although it is common knowledge that Muslims pray to the East, did you know that the early Christians prayed to the East and had the east wall in their house usually contained the holy icons and crosses!
We said a rosary on the way to the the church of the Visitation. We hiked part of the way up to the church. The journey was through the hills from Judea into Samaria. Our tour guide said pilgrims hike the journey, and it takes about 17 days. The church was built over the site of the house of Elizabeth and Zechariah. In the courtyard and all around the church are tiles containing the Magnificat. “ My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord....” in every language you could possibly imagine. Our tour guide said it for us in Hebrew, one of the spoken languages of Jesus. He would have also known Aramaic (primarily only spoken by Christian Syrians), and Greek.
To finish up the day, we had a holy hour in the Basilica of Agony. I placed all your intentions on the rock of agony during our holy hour, and we were able to kiss it before we left. This adoration to me gave a whole new meaning to, “ Could you not wait one hour with me?” So many times we are too busy for our Lord and yet during His agony all He wants is our company. How can I deny Him? After adoration we had a chance to walk through the Garden of Gethsemane at night, the way the Jesus would have. You could almost feel the sadness in the Olive Trees.
I love you all! Sorry this was so long, but we did many things today!
