U.S. Catholics help Palestinian Catholics stay in Holy Land

On an ordinary Sunday, Mass-goers in San Antonio meet fellow Catholics from Palestine who, beyond the religious articles they have brought for sale, allow U.S. Catholics to help them fulfil a dream.

David David, Jack Odeh, and Sami Mubarak are from Beit Sahour, a town in Palestine just over 2 miles away from Bethlehem. They visited the parish of Blessed Sacrament in San Antonio last Sunday.

Before us were arrayed beautiful religious articles made of olive wood from Bethlehem — crucifixes, statues, nativity sets…. Behind these religious articles are 500 Palestinian families with a dream. Those who purchase these items not only receive the fruit of the faith of fellow Catholics which will nourish their own faith. They in turn are helping their brothers and sisters fulfil their dream of staying in the Holy Land.

“I’m here to do our mission for Christian families in the Holy Land,” Jack Odeh explained to me. “We have a lot of problems there,” he continued.

Plight of the Christian family in the Holy Land

The primary problem he cited revolves around the ability for Christians to stay in the Holy Land. “It’s a very important place,” Mr Odeh emphasized. “It’s where Jesus was born, where he died.” It’s important, he said, that Christian families remain there.

We can’t leave this land

The outbreak of the conflict on October 7, 2023, has directly impacted the livelihoods of the people living in the Palestinian territories. The tourists who used to come to their store in Bethlehem “are afraid” to come, Mr Odeh said. Now, he goes back and forth, making the religious articles available in parishes across the United States.

More than 500 Christian Palestinian families, he said, are behind the making of the religious articles made from olive wood from Bethlehem. “All the income,” he said, “goes there for the Christian families, to let them stay in the Holy Land because we don’t want anybody to leave the Holy Land because it is the Holy Place, the Holy Land. It’s where Jesus died…. We can’t leave this land.”

Christians are in the middle

While they are on the road, they are in frequent contact with loved ones back home. “We have fighting there between Jews and Muslims, and all the Christians are in the middle…. We want peace; we don’t like this life,” Mr Odeh said. “But we can’t leave it because my family is there. I call them more than 10 times a day,” he recounted because they could be bombed at any minute. Their experience of the situation, he said, is different than those who do not experience it first-hand.

“The news,” he ended, “is not good.” Christians living there really know what is going on, and news about them is not getting out. The people, he said, need help.

By Sr Bernadette M. Reis, fsp