For the Good

of All His Church.

   That is said in most every Catholic Mass. For our good and the good of all His Church. His Church originally was all Jews. He came first to save the Jew then the Gentile. Insofar as his own people rejected Him he brought salvation to all.  So Christians have not only a foundational faith family in the Jewish people but they owe their very salvation to the Jews. Salvation comes from the Jews. Jesus was the quintessential righteous Jew. Now All his Church means all Jews who are definitionally his family and all Christians who call on the name of Jesus as Lord who are saved by him.  Christians are baby Jews so to speak, if they are authentic Christians. 

    So Christians take a peculiar interest in the State of Israel which is the homeland of all Jews considered by Jews to be Jews. Most do not consider Christians Jews while many Christians consider themselves baby Jews. Jesus is the fulfillment of the prophecies. The 'golden rule' Christians think Jesus invented of do unto others as you would have them do to you and love others as you would wish to be loved actually is a standard long held Jewish platitudinous proverb which existed in scripture long before Jesus lived. It is a classically Jewish ethical precept. 

     Now in Israel there are Jews and there are Christians who have Palestinian ethnic heritage. 

According to Christian teaching they are one faith family. 

    Today at the New America Foundation the head of J Street noted that Israel is driving itself off a cliff essentially and Americans who misunderstand what is going on are duplicitous. This is the fault in part of the rightest wing of Christian evangelical zionists a la Hagee and Beck. Beck is a dingdong and barely worth the print -he's even too rightwingnutty for Murdock and its dubious Mormons are even Christians even if they think they are. So I won't bother with the Beck Mess. Hagee is more dangerous because he purports to be about rapturous prophesy which is in fact of the sort of False Prophesy that got people stoned in ancient days. There is absolutely nothing in the bible that links the political creation of a state for Jews to the Revelationary rapture in the end times prophesies written by the Apostle John or anywhere. Most Christians with any sense, and all Catholics reject it as Texan tom -foolery which is easily co-opted for a political agenda.

     There is a bit of serious political persecution going on now for those who challenge what Israel is doing, and the implicit slander that to speak against any political posture means one is anti-Israel or worse anti-Semetic. In fact, those who argue for a two state solution with peace and security for Palestinians believe whole heartedly, and likely rightly that this is the key to Israel's political salvation and secure future. Organizations like J-Street fill a necessary vital void to give voice to the people who want open dialogue in keeping with Jewish values. Open dialogue, and not stripping of First Amendment sort of rights with anti-boycott law or otherwise curbing free speech and free press and open dialogue with possible dissent is anti-Jewish and anti-democratic, argued the J-Street leader who has written a book on the subject.

     Of course there should be open dialogue. Of course, there should be no law suppressing voicing  dissent or free speech or civilly punishing people for expressing their views. That does start to look unhelpfully fascist. 

     People may not want to talk to each other but that can not stop anyone who wants to talk to talk. Even if they disagree. Parts of the Progressive Jewish community are deeply chagrined at what they see going on and the trajectory they imagine to come. They must feel a little like Jeremiah shouting with everyone wanting him to please shut up. Or- like the John the Baptist, who called people to self reflection and repentance, engaging in water purification rituals to cleanse of the iniquities, and shouting in the wilderness with perpetual fasting on nothing but locusts and wild honey. 

   Love your neighbor as yourself. 

The parable from the Christian scriptures of the Good Samaritan is instructive here. Jesus told a parable in which a man was beaten and left for dead by the side of the road. It is inferred he is a Jewish man. A Levite saw him and walked on the other side of the road ignoring him. A Jewish Priest (such as do not exist in modern times) saw him and walked on the other side of the road ignoring him. A Samaritan (a half breed, loathed despised deemed lesser being) saw him and took compassion on him, lifted him on his donkey, walked him to the nearest Inn dressing his wounds and paid the Inn Keeper to let him stay as long as he needed saying- I will pay whatever the bill is, essentially. Who was the good neighbor to the beaten man? Jesus lesson is that the person with a higher holier soul is the one who exercised compassion and acted on it. The Higher Holier soul is the one who sees someone in distress and tries to heal and make whole meeting basic needs. The higher holier soul of Israel is achieved when Israel understands that God is calling it to a much greater compassionate place with regard to the 

Palestinians that they are passing by, whose basic needs are getting in some cases ignored. 

Proverbs says a kind word diffuses anger. 

Meeting people's basic needs diffuses war. 

     This is where The Good of All His Church is found- where Justice kisses Peace. Where all have compassion on each other and the soul of all humanity is raised to a place much holier. Holy Holy Holy. Kadosh Kadosh Kadosh.