from Cindy

This morning my roommate Janet asked me if I preach like I write. “Oh, no,” I exclaimed, realizing how much I do run on when I blog. Oh, well. Only people who love me will be reading this, and you guys have a lot of patience, right? Let’s see, today we went to Sepphoris, which is an ancient city, the biggest one in Galilee in Jesus’ day. It’s all in ruins, but there have been a number of archeological digs (including one by Dr. Strange, who taught me Old Testament at USF), and it was really fascinating. There’s this one house up on a mountain, and the mosaic floor has been redone, and it was just beautiful. And I was aware of the labor that would have gone into it, and of the, oh never mind, I’m getting too heavy here, but suffice it to say that I was thinking that maybe Jesus was thinking of the wealth of Sepphoris when he said, “Woe to you who are rich now…”

Then we went to Nazareth, and it’s the biggest Arab city in Israel, and it was neat to be in an Arab city. When we went up the hill we passed into the Jewish part, and it was all nice and pretty and perfect, and then when we went back down, it became more impoverished. The Arabs who live there are Israeli citizens, though, so have freedoms that the Arabs who live in the West Bank do not.

We went to several churches, and saw the cave where the angel supposedly appeared to Mary, and then also the little church that honors Joseph. There’s a dig under that church, and we could look down and see the actual ancient city of Nazareth from the time of Jesus, or pieces of it, rather, and that was neat. And we saw a baptismal font (hole in the ground, so Michael’s right when he tells us about baptism) that was actually used before the time of Constantine.

Oh, and we saw all these wonderful pieces of art depicting Mary: I just love her!
Then we drove by Mt. Tabor, which I inaccurately reported on yesterday, I think. I can’t see my blog, but the truth is that we don’t know where the transfiguration took place, but tradition says Mt. Tabor. THEN we went to the Jordan River, and I stuck my feet in there. It looks like the Hillsborough River in Tampa, so you know I liked it. It’s not where they say that Jesus was baptized—we can’t get there because it’s in Jordan, I think. Though that may be wrong. Trish told me that they used to sell these plastic Jesuses at the site where we were, and you could screw off their heads and then fill them with water. So you KNOW that that’s the ONLY thing that I want, and now they aren’t selling them, and now I’m miserable thinking that I’ll never have one. I’ve told all the other pastors, “If you find one, BUY IT, and I will pay you back.”

I have lots more to tell you, but need to stop now. I will just say that I am strongly feeling the disconnect between seeing all these holy places knowing that the Palestinians who live in the West Bank cannot come here.
Love,
Cindy