‘Evangelicals side with Israel. That’s hurting Palestinian Christians.’

December 28, 2016 in News by RBN Staff

An Armenian Christian clergyman dusts a column in the Church of the Nativity, marking believed location of the birth of Jesus, in Bethlehem. (EPA)

An Armenian Christian clergyman dusts a column in the Church of the Nativity, marking believed location of the birth of Jesus, in Bethlehem. (EPA)

Source: WHTT

Your editor hopes you will read every word of the Washington Post’s unusual coverage of the problems Christians face living In Israel, written by Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, who is an assistant editor at Foreign Policy magazine.  We quote part of the story here, but It deserves to be examined in full by every American Follower of Jesus. We have contributed a few notes of our own which I hope will clarify the understandable confusion over the much misused word, “evangelical.”  

Several Traditional Christian denominations have historically used “Evangelical” attached to their names, including many traditional thinking Lutherans and Presbyterians, but most of these reject the ultra-modernizations of the bible started by Darby and Scofield in the 19th Century.  We hope every reader will finish this wonderfully perceptive story by Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, with this one comment of ours in mind, and we thank the author and the Washington Post.

Some of those who describe themselves as “evangelicals” are more correctly a part of a new, 150 year old sect that follows the teachings of contemporary bible writers like John Nelson Darby and Cyrus I. Scofield. We have dubbed them ‘Neo-Christians,” defining them as those who teach and preach that the present day State of Israel is the fulfillment of Biblical Prophesy.  A list of our own works is offered herein to explain “Neo-Christianity” or Christian Zionism, and how it differs from Traditional Protestant Christ-Following, and Roman Catholic teachings about Jesus and The Holy Land as well.– Editor CEC

Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian begins: “This week, Christmas pageants across the country will reenact the scenes of the nativity; carolers will sing the beloved hymn, “O Little Town of Bethlehem”; and millions will turn their hearts toward that ancient city, where many believe that Jesus was born. But it’s likely most Americans haven’t pondered what that birthplace is like today — or who lives there.”

“The existence of Palestinian Christians, and the difficulties they face under Israeli occupation in their homeland, is a blind spot for American Christians. Evangelicals in particular are often strong supporters of Israel and suspicious of Muslims but don’t seem to realize that those aren’t the only groups at play in the region.”

” It makes sense that the Holy Land, perceived as being embodied by the State of Israel, is of particular concern to Christians. And to the degree that many evangelical Christians are conservative Republicans, their worldview matches up with an American foreign policy view that places a premium on Israeli security. But by forgetting their Palestinian coreligionists, American Christians aren’t just missing the complexity of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they are missing an opportunity to live out the message of peace that Jesus, born in Bethlehem, gave to the world…”

“Bethlehem is the most heavily Christian city in Palestine. Its Arab Christian mayor, Vera Baboun, describes her hometown the “capital of Christmas” and says that between Bethlehem proper and the surrounding Bethlehem governate, there are upward of 38,000 Christian residents. Christmas celebrations there form an integral part of city life. “Bethlehem is the city that gave the message of peace to the whole world,” Baboun told me in a November interview at a conference hosted by the Middle East Institute in Washington, D.C. “But today, Bethlehem does not live the peace that it gave to the whole world.”  Read the rest of this timely and truthful story here..

Editor wraps up: For We Hold These Truths’ contribution to understanding of “Evangelicalism” and Christian Zionism, we suggest Christian Zionism, The Tragedy and The Turning, a twenty-nine minute film, and or, our many articles on the subject indexed here (CLICK TO READ MORE)