Jerusalem is no place for those who think of religion as spiritual and metaphorical

The passion of Christ is being played out this week in Jerusalem by the custos, or Guardian of the Holy Places, a genial Franciscan, Fr Francesco Patton. I met him in the parlour of his priory, where he reeled off in engagingly accented English the different celebrations of the season in different places.

“On Monday, we read the Gospel about when Jesus went to Bethany and have a special blessing of oil and scent [for Mary, sister of Martha] in Bethany; on Thursday, the Latin Patriarch is in the Holy Sepulchre; in the night in Gethsemane there’s one hour of prayer; on Friday, the carrying of the Cross for the Flagellation through the Via Dolorosa and we finish in the Holy Sepulchre. During the night we celebrate the Passion of Jesus and we dramatise the Gospel … the Cross is a special cross; we put Jesus on the Stone of Anointing – this is not the liturgy, it’s something that is very understandable for our local Christians … they see what they read. We have the Paschal Vigil, which starts with the new fire …; and on the Monday after Easter we celebrate the Emmaus meeting of Jesus and two disciples.”

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User Comments (2)

Comment by: Edmund

Posted: 18/04/2022 18:11:16

In response to Thomas: Moslems are in Jerusalem, too. The churches, surely, need to keep a strong connection to the holy places in Jerusalem: these sites are our roots-the corruption and the intra-Christian conflicts in Jerusalem aside.
PS
It’s such a pity that the editor does not allow us more scope to comment on other articles on this site. And, further: there is so little discussion across the whole site.

Comment by: Thomas

Posted: 18/04/2022 08:19:35

We are said to be living temples of the Holy Spirit therefore we don’t need the ‘holy’ places. Given the Greek Orthodox corruption re sales and the well-known corruption of the Vatican bank, etc, perhaps it’s time to leave all Jerusalem to the Jewish people? These so-called ‘holy’ places have engendered so much hostility and bitterness between so-called ‘religious’ not to mention profound scandal. The Easter message given by Christ is to ‘go out’ to the whole world, not to stay inside so-called ‘holy’ places where the next Patriarch might flog for thirty pieces of silver.