Canterbury

by David Skidmore
Lambeth Conference Communications

A dramatic presentation in a plenary session today produced its own drama when the soon to be enthroned bishop of Jerusalem walked out in protest over language that he felt slighted Palestinian interests in the Holy Land.

The play, "Wresting with Angels"-performed during the morning plenary presentation The Bible, the World and the Church-earned enthusiastic applause from most of the bishops and spouses present but not from Bishop Riah Abu el-Assal, bishop-coadjutor of the Diocese of Jerusalem.

"I must say I felt unhappy to the point of being sick," said Bishop Riah in a press conference following the plenary. So unhappy, he said, that he walked out during the session's keynote address by David Ford, Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge.

The source of his distress was the play's approach to the origin of Israel. Based mostly on the Old Testament story of Jacob wrestling with Esau in the Book of Genesis, the play ends with Jacob and Esau embracing, and members of the cast writing "Judah" and "Israel" on two sticks and joining them to symbolize the creation of the nation of Israel. For Bishop Riah this came across as an affront to the people of Palestine since Judah to them is the West Bank-the home of over 3 million Palestinians and territory occupied by Israel since the 1967 Six Day War.

"Judah today, in political terms, stands for the West Bank-the occupied West Bank," said Bishop Riah, and the international community, particularly the United Nations, supports a complete withdrawal by Israel as a condition for a lasting peace.

By symbolically joining Judah with Israel, said Bishop Riah, the play gave credence to the cause of Christian fundamentalists who support efforts by hardline Orthodox Israelis to annex the West Bank and Jerusalem.

If the writers had been more sensitive to the Palestinian interests, they would have included Ismael and his issue in that scene, he said, and thus underscored that the divine blessing comes to all who worship God-not Israel alone.

He would also have preferred to see the Gospel used as the vehicle for the theme of peacemaking, rather than a story from the Old Testament.

"There is so much in the New Testament that we can bring to the conference on reconciliation," he said, noting that "we are the people of the New Testament."

The Old Testament, he added, has been misused for over 50 years by Christian fundamentalists who see the creation of the modern state of Israel as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. These people, who are mostly American, he said, are more Zionist than Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel.

Though he said he was tempted to leave the conference, Bishop Riah said he decided to stay and press for a dialogue on the Holy Land after meeting with Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey.

"I had a word with Dr. Carey and we prayed about it," he said.

While painful, the snub is not worth risking a major confrontation with conservative evangelicals, he said. "We Palestinians have learned to bury our dead and start again," he said.

Bishop Riah said he was looking forward to the challenge of educating bishops of the conference on the situation of Palestinian Christians in the Holy Land. "Ignorance breeds indifference. The only way to do away with indifference is to invite them to come and see for themselves," he said.

There is also a need for "a proper Christian-Christian dialogue on Christian thinking," especially related to the Old Testament, he added.

Bishop Stephen Sykes of the Diocese of Ely, who coordinated the plenary presentation, said he had seen the play for the first time that morning and would "consider very carefully" the concerns raised by Bishop Riah. He also "approved thoroughly" Bishop Riah's proposal for a dialogue at the conference on the Christian experience in the Holy Land.

Paul Burbridge, who directed and helped script the play, said his team was unaware that the language might pose a problem for Palestinian Christians. "It is unfortunate that we have discovered a trip wire that we didn't know was there," he said. While they were aware of the theological connotations, they had no inkling of the play's political overtones, he said. The script, he noted, had been reviewed by theologians from Cambridge University, and a copy had been faxed to the Lambeth Conference office well in advance to allow for translation.

Mr. Burbridge said he was sorry for the unintentional slight and said he would be meeting with Bishop Riah to offer his apology.

Mr. Burbridge's company, Riding Lights Theatre in York, has 21 years of experience writing and staging Biblically centered plays and sketches, and is known throughout England and the Anglican Communion for its work.