Father Dave's Journal

posted: Friday, February 24th, 2000

Sorry for the delay, there were no computers with E-mail to be found. On the 17th of February, our group had a wonderful mass in a crusader chapel inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It was a 6:00am. Then we returned to the hotel for breakfast and then came back to the Old City for some more touring. We started the tour with a visit to the Dome of the Rock and the Eliazar Mosque, a vey holy site for present day moslems. The security was tight as you can imagine so it took us awhile to get through the checkpoint. But it was well worth the wait. As we entered the Dome of the Rock, we were instructed to take our shoes off and enter in our stocking feet. The floors of this site were covered in plush persian rugs so the floor was never a problem for our feet. Inside this structure is a huge rock which the moslems believe was the site where Mohammed was lifted up and taken to Mecca. The Christians believe that this is the Rock where Abraham was going to sacrifice Issac his son in accord to God's command until God stopped him through the intercession of an angel who told Abraham to sacrifice a ram instead. We prayed the Stations of the Cross along the origonal way of the cross. It was a very eerie experience. To walk the streets that Jesus did and witness first hand the atmosphere that was present when he walked those final steps. I think sometimes we forget that his suffering took place in a busy marketplace and that the streets were crowded with buyers and sellers. We all had some interesting feelings after that prayer experience. The stations took us right back to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre where the last five stations of the cross were housed. We entered to find throngs of people praying, sightseeing, and crying. As we made our way through the church we came to the station where Jesus' body was taken down from the cross. There is a anointing stone at this spot in the church, a stone where the body was laid so that it could be prepared for burial. A couple of woman were kneeling by it daubing it with cotton wads of oil, a practice that is done quite often by those who come to reverence it. It hit our group pretty hard to see that spectacle and a number of us began to cry.

It was very emotional. Then we moved to the tomb and got in line to enter the actual place for prayer. Several times while we waited, the line was disrupted so handicapped people could be carried inside. If you every want to be humbled, watch a crippled young woman or man get carrid into a place of great sadness. You are changed for life when you witness something of that calibur.

After everyone had been through the tomb we gathered over in the resurrection chapel and then we proceeded to go our seperate ways for lunch and an a free afternoon in the city. Some of the group headed back to the hotel while others proceeded to experience the deep richness of various cultures that the old city offered. A few of us headed to a small Israeli cafe where we gnoshed on falafels ( a pita bread sandwich made of mashed peas that are deep fried into small mcnugget size pucks, lettuce, cabbage, tomatoes, and a variation on a ranch dressing. Some venders even put a humus spread in as well.) Schwarmes ( a pita sandwich with chicken or lamb meat) french fries, and some really sweet desserts. The rest of the afternoon went pretty quickly.

We then returned to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to view some missed attractions. I led the group into the well where St. Helen, Emperor Constantine's mother found the original crosses. You descend this set of stairs into a pit where there is a statue of Helen holding the true cross and there is an image of Jesus on the wall that dates back to earlier times. On the walls of the stairs are hundreds of crusader crosses carved by past pilgrims who over the centuries have journeyed to this holy place.

After some more touring of the church and the city, we started to head back. WE were to have met our bus at the Jaffa gate of the old city for a ride back to the Hotel. Three of us still wanted to tour some more, so we left our group at the Jaffa gate and headed into the Armenian section of the Old City. I need to explain the set up of the old walled city here. The Old City of Jerusalem that exists inside the old walls is quartered. There is the Jewish Quarter, the Armenian Quarter, the Christian Quarter, and the Moslem Quarter. Each section is distinctive and defined by the group that lives there. The Jewish Quarter contains the Western wall or Wailing Wall of the Old Temple which dates back to before 70AD, the year in which the temple was destroyed.

After walking around the Armenian quarter, John Schmitz, Pat Casey, and I stopped ina small cafe for a final drink to celebrate our last night in Jerusalem. John had a turkish coffee, Pat had a bottle of tangerine juice, and i had a coke. Then we visited the wailing or western wall one more time. We went right up to it this time and saw the Jewish men and women praying in front of it. A young Jewish couple was all dressed up in wedding clothes and celebrating with family members. Young men where reading from the sacred scrolls of the Torah in preparation for their eventual bar mitzvahs. We then headed to the Damascus Gate where we caught a cab home for dinner with the group. We had a nice dinner in the hotel restaurant and then moved to another dining room for a closing prayer service. What the group did not know was that they were about to be quizzed about there experience in Jerusalem and all of Israel. Everyone was given a number and that number corelated to a question. Doug Schmitz was instructed by Fr. Dave to pull a number out of a bag. The number would then indicate who would receive the question and what the question would be. If they got the question right, they could pick a special prize out of another bag. If someone did not know the answer to a question they could use a lifeline to another member in the group to help them out. We had a great time with a lot of laughs and then each pilgrim was presented with an official certificate announcing that they had officially completed the Jerusalem and Israeli phase of the pilgrimage. With sadness we packed our suitcases, bid farewell to our superb guide Moeshi and our more then competent driver Abbe and we started our next phase of the trip: The eternal city of Rome.

The flight was quick by some standards. We arrived in Rome and were met by our tour guide, Eileen. She had a thick irish broque and alot of energy. We were wisked off to our hotel, by our bus driver Sergio.