Not that far?

Our hearts are straining for peace. Whether in the media circles around Newtown, Connecticut, or the ancient town of Bethlehem, it is hard to find peace. Yet on this Christmas Eve, we especially hope to find some measure, or hope, of peace.

Last week in our family’s church an older lady greeted me with, “I know your dad is happy to have you home.” She went on to tell me, “You know I have a friend in Lebanon. Their house got bombed by the Israelis, but you know, I think Israel can do anything it wants to defend itself!” I wasn’t sure whether or not our conversation was meant to be political, or whether or not I was meant to dispute her dogmatic approach to Israeli bombings, but I just said, “I am inclined to a different opinion.”

Tonight in churches around the world people will remember the birth of the babe in Bethlehem. We will sing of the birth; we will hope for peace.

This is my sixth Christmas-time to come home from the Middle East. Peace is elusive. People often ask me what I think of the prospects of peace in the Middle East. Here are a few thoughts about the prospects of peace as 2012 comes to a close: a little over a month ago Israeli missiles targeted and hit Ahmed Al-Jabari, the strongman of Hamas and the head of its military wing. Another assassination… According to what I read in the papers, and according to Israeli leaders, deterrence will be achieved once again by targeting and killing military and political leaders in Gaza and hitting hard at Hamas’ military infrastructure.

Just another death in the endless struggle for calm in the Middle East, but as wiser friends in Jordan explained to me, this assassination may eventually be seen as a grave and short-sighted error. It is not that Mr. Jabari was known as a man of peace—no, he did not believe peace was possible, but he had abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and kept him alive and ensured his safety as an insurance policy with Israel, and was the person responsible for cease-fires in the vitriolic chess game over Gaza.

How can we move past the patterns of the past? How can we find peace?

Here is what I have learned as I looked more closely at this region: Israeli intelligence discovers information about an impeding terrorist attack from Gaza. The Israeli Army takes pre-emptive action with an airstrike against the suspected terrorist cells and the typical result is between 10 and 25 casualties in Gaza, zero casualties in Israel and large amounts of property damage on both sides.

As I read about it, this is always presented in Israel as a war of “no choice.” The only thing that I see that has not been tried and tested is an agreement for a long-term cease fire. I do agree that no government can tolerate having its civilian population attacked by rockets by a neighboring territory. But with Mr. Jabari’s death, did with him die the possibility of long-term cease-fire?

Am I just a sentimental, middle-aged fool? Hope for peace has rapidly diminished. Israeli people interviewed always say, “We have no one to make peace with.” But as I have watched and waited, in these five years, Israel and its leaders have failed to move toward peace. There has been no acknowledgement of what the United Nations declared in 1967 for the borders.

Mr. Netanyahu has ignored the peace process for most of his term. For the first time in 20 years since the Oslo Accords, there is nothing from the Israeli government talking about a two-state solution. In fact, there was a day celebrated at KA about six weeks ago, a day called, “Peace Day.” A noted Jordanian governmental minister came to speak, one who has come before and always jazzed up the crowd. This year his talk was so depressing it was difficult to remember the reason for the day. He spoke about how many Jordanians wish now the Oslo Peace Accords had not been erected 19 years ago—he said people are tired of hoping peace is around the corner.

I have an acquaintance of a friend who commented to her in an email that when she moved to Jordan in the late 90s that she heard a lot of Hebrew at Petra, and she heard from Israeli acquaintances that in those days there was never any question of whether Israel and the Palestinians would make peace, the question was just when.

“It’s not the missiles that are breaking me. It’s the lack of an alternative to them,” she says now.

Mr. Netanyahu has avoided the Palestinian issue while he has increased the settlement building on Palestinian land within Israel. He seems to have no plans to make peace. No Israeli leader is saying, “Enough of blood and tears.” I do agree that Israel has the right to protect its citizens. But on my grown-up Christmas list I wish Israel’s current leaders would recognize that the best defense is peace.

A day before we all left KA for our winter break we had a Christmas carol sing-along. Some who came don’t know the words, so the organizers projected the words for us to sing. At the end of “The First Noel,” as I sang along for memory, I noticed that the words that always end, “Born is the king of Israel,” are sung differently in Jordan. They sing the words, “Born is the king, Emmanuel.” Hadley and I stole a look at each other, chuckled, and whispered, “Well, of course that’s how they would sing it!”

But while it may be a nod simply to not sing about the difficult state of Israel, that word is always welcome. Emmanuel. Emmanuel. God with us. Maybe that’s the missing piece of peace.

Anyway, recently His Majesty came to KA for a talk about the geopolitics of the region. He is hopeful that a move toward peace might happen now that the US Presidential election is over. He observed that United States politicians never feel they can do much in the Arab region in the first term of a presidency. But when the fear of electoral reprisal is passed, he hopes that maybe in this second term of President Obama, there may be overtures toward peace again.


Tonight my sister and I will sing in our family’s church. There isn’t anything novel in the announcement of that performance—we have been singing on Christmas Eve together, without fail, every year since I was 10 and she was 7. If you know about where my age falls, you can do the math, and figure out that this is a tradition that dates back to the era of Watergate in American politics.

Over the years, of course, many variables have affected this set-in-stone performance. There has been a name change in terms of what this church has been called (my family still is not happy about the change in 2004—my father suggested they just call it “The Anything Goes” church). There were some years my mother was in the hospital, and one memorable Christmas Eve where doctors allowed her out of the hospital for three hours so she could be bundled up—IV and all—to come to the church and hear us sing. There were years when the hairstyles and the outfits mattered so much more than the song being delivered to the church family. There was the year the church team forgot to turn on the heat, and up until I put my fingers on the keyboard, I kept my hands encased in much-needed gloves.

Ever since my sister got married in 1994 she has made a point of locating songs for Christmas Eve that illumine parts of the Christmas story we might have forgotten—she has made it her mission to act as surrogate pastor and remind us that there are nuggets of wisdom still to be gleaned by the oft-told Christmas story. For years I had chosen semi-flashy pieces designed to show off our vocal skills—then as Elizabeth took hold of the annual song choice (and leave no doubt—she is in charge of choosing!) she chose songs along the lines of Amy Grant’s “Grown-Up Christmas List” that act as beautiful meditations of how we can look into the traditions and stories and find something refreshing, re-invigorating, and re-affirming.

We are returning to a song we sang in 2008, a song entitled, “Not That Far From Bethlehem.” Of course while in Jordan I seriously am not that far from the real Bethlehem.

The words to the song Elizabeth chose offer this refrain:

We’re not that far from Bethlehem—

where all our hope and joy began.

For when our hearts still cherish Him,

We’re not that far from Bethlehem.



I guess on Christmas Eve we are prone to hope for miracles. We yearn for them. Deep down most of us believe that darkness can be overcome. The Messiah who showed up, however, had different trappings of glory—I guess one could call it the glory of humility. This messiah emerged as a baby who could not eat solid food and depended on an unwed teen-age mother for shelter, food, and love. God’s visit to earth was in an out-of-the-way shelter in a feed trough.

With all my Jewish and Muslim friends I try and look for an ecumenical approach to Christmas, besides the sacred understanding of the birth of the Messiah. And I am not talking about a Santa Claus spin on the holiday or trying to cover up religiosity. I mean—in the birth in Bethlehem, how can we walk away with an ecumenical understanding? Simply put: Jesus’ birth is a reiteration that love came down, and offered vast promise. It is about the power of love to change, and the power of cherishing each other. Christmas offers us that opportunity to turn back to those promises—those hopes and joys, and remind ourselves we should never allow ourselves to be that far from Bethlehem.

We’re not that far from Bethlehem—

where all our hope and joy began.

For when our hearts still cherish Him,

We’re not that far from Bethlehem.