Being Christians in the Middle East is a vocation, not a privilege. Amongst Jews and Muslims they are summoned to profess that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah and the Son of God who died and rose for the salvation of all men.
The Beatitude of the Master: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” has not remained empty words. Being the salt of the earth and the yeast of the dough requires being present in society with an identity of our own. Despite all the difficulties, a minority can be creative. Being Christians in the Middle East means believing in a God-Trinity. God the Father loves his Son.
The Son is loved by the Father and the Spirit is love. In love there is the solution to hatred and war. Reconciliation based on forgiveness continues to be the key to peace. Being Christians in the Middle East means being witnesses of future hope. Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead. All will be judged on the love that they will have had for others.
“Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God.” Being Christians in the Middle East means believing in the Church, one, holy and Catholic, the work in the Spirit of God. This Church has become incultured in the Semitic world, in Ethiopia, in North Africa, in Israel, in Asia Minor and throughout the Orient before being incultured in the Hellenistic world. It speaks different languages. This pluralism not mean division, it means a dynamic search for unity to reach a single heart, a single soul. The truth is symphonic.
Being Christians in the Middle East means recognizing the roots of Christianity in the Old Testament and in Judaism. The Jewish people who received the revelation first gave us the scriptures that we read in a Christological and spiritual interpretation. They gave us Jesus, our Saviour, born to Mary, For this we are grateful to them. Being Christians in the Middle East means looking for the image of God in every man, especially in the Muslim in the midst of who many communities live. The Christian, who is not a second-class citizen, asks for respect of human rights, freedom of worship and conscience, from the Muslim. He asks for reciprocity: just as Muslims in Europe claim their rights, the same rights must be granted to the Christians in the East. The Oriental Churches have a marvellous spiritual heritage: holy fathers and doctors have enlightened this community and the whole of the Church. Many martyrs have shown their faith in Christ. Their liturgies are a participation in the celestial Jerusalem.
Those who have preferred emigration can share this wealth with their Western brothers. The globalized world is launching new challenges to the Christians of the West and of the East. The new world, which has come into being with the Internet, bioethics and space research, requires a new evangelization which does not need orators but authentic witnesses. An appropriate unified catechesis for adults for all communities will allow facing up to the false divinities offered by the modern world. Christians are like David before Goliath. David took a stick and five stones, symbols of the cross and the five books of the Bible, says Hippolytus of Rome. The sling he used to throw the stones is charity. The Church has always breathed with its two lungs: the West and the East which are summoned to work together more closely in case of need to allow Christ’s body to offer the world salvation.
The Catholic Churches see in the immigrants to the East who have come to seek work brothers to all effects. Jerusalem is the mother of all peoples. They were all born there. The Lord asked his disciples to stay in the city. In order for the city to fulfil its mission of “visio pacis”, Christians of all over the world are invited to resume the tradition of pilgrimages in the footsteps of their master. The same is to be said for pilgrimages in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Asia Minor which will allow encounters with the living stones that are the communities and to establish new forms of knowledge and collaboration. The Catholic Churches of the Orient recognize the charisma of Peter which is to be a sign and tool of unity in the exercise of the supremacy in charity.
In their precarious situations they have recourse to the successor of Peter to reinforce unity. The Catholic Churches also recognize in the apostle John a charisma that is very close to their heart. They take the prayer for the unity of the disciples of Jesus that he handed down as their own. The mother of Jesus, who is the Daughter of Sion and the star of the Orient was present in the Cenacle with the apostles, the women and brothers of Jesus. She is the one who gives all the women in the Orient the strength and the courage that she showed under the cross of her Son. She is the queen of the hope of every man that suffers and the mother of the new evangelization.