Greetings from Ramallah!

by Subdeacon Anthony Camille Baba — posted by permission.

The title should read …”A Pilgrimage thus far,” and that it’s been! We got here safely on Tuesday evening about 4ish but didn’t leave the airport until an hour or so after that. My parents got their passports stamped but I on the other hand had to wait. I fit the description: young, Arab, young, and Arab. They didn’t give me a hard time really, they asked me a couple questions and after a while gave me back my passport and that was it.

Back to the should be title … very early this morning (Holy Thursday), I drove to Jerusalem from Ramallah with my parents (they would drive back after dropping me off) and an 8 mile drive took us almost an hour, without traffic. There were two checkpoints and lots and lots of curvy and bumpy roads.

I met with the son (George) of the Priest in Jerusalem (Fr. Elias Yaghnam) at St. James Cathedral for the Divine Liturgy. It was AWESOME! George got me right in there with the rest of the chanters, I was standing right next to the Bishop’s throne. It wouldn’t be long until the Patriarch would make his way there. Literally speaking, I could see his nose hairs. There were so many people taking pictures and I’m sure I was in all of them. 🙂

Before the Liturgy was over, George and I walked outside to the courtyard where the service of the foot washing would take place, but before the Liturgy started, there was hardly anyone in the courtyard and by the time we went out, there were probably 1,000 people barricaded. We walked through the open areas that the Patriarch and clergy would be processing and made our way to the top of a building to get a REALLY AWESOME view! Unreal. It was very neat, a bit theatrical but not in any negative way.

Before the foot washing service started, a big priest walked up a really skinny ladder to stand on a very small platform to read the Gospel. He was like the narrator, he would say, “Jesus said” and the Patriarch would actually say what Jesus said. Then the priest would say, “Then Simon-Peter said” and one of the 12 priests who was assigned to Simon-Peter would complete the sentence. There was a crew standing next to me with a really high-tec video camera and microphone…they’re from New York and there for PBS. They said the DVD would be on sale and that it would be aired on PBS in a year.

That’s all I got for now, I’m hopeful that I’ll be there again on Holy Saturday morning for the Divine Liturgy and especially to see the uncreated Light. Aka The Holy Fire, or the “light that needs no bic.” 🙂

Please be assured of my prayers at these most holy places, and please keep me in your prayers. I’ll try to keep y’all updated, it’s not very difficult finding one of these “IN-TERRR-NET” Cafes.

As-salam-‘ah-lay-kum,
Camille

PS – It’s what they say anywhere and everywhere around here, Christian or non.

Image courtesy of IOCC.