Fierce Landscapes

I'd always heard that Israel was a land of contrasts. But I'd always thought that was the classic cliched hyperbole that you expect from tourist advertising. Of course there are contrasts - few countries are geographically uniform. But what is striking is the sheer magnitude of the differences within a few miles. From the shores of the Sea of Galilee to the fertile headwaters of the Jordan to the abandoned Syrian tanks of the Golan Heights takes little more than an hour to drive.

Somehow - I imagine thanks to my Children's Illustrated Bible - I had imagined this to be a more pastoral land, echoing the gentler contours of New England rather than the harsher reality of a land formed of volcanic eruption, earthquake, and erosion.

Imagine Jesus sailing on a lake that one moment is mirror still, and the next whipped by winds tearing past a hill that looks like it has been attacked with a meat cleaver, walking northwards through green fields spattered with stone, along a marshy stream that eventually becomes the Jordan River, and towards the cliff face in whose shadow the city of Caesarea Philippi was built, and where Peter confessed that Jesus was the Christ. His own understanding of himself and his mission must have been shaped by these places. No wonder that the Jesus of the gospels is not so much "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild" as a man of passion and grace in equal measure, one who healed a synagogue leader's beloved daughter and spoke woe on the scribes and the pharisees.

About ten years ago I read a book called "The Solace of Fierce Landscapes" by Belden Lane. In it, he speaks of the relationship between spirituality and landscape: the ways in which the way we experience God is shaped by our environment. The extremes of the land echo the extremes of our lives, birth and death, and their reverberations in between. And so often, it is in those extreme and liminal places that we not only meet God, but find our faith reshaped and renewed.

The Rev. Dr. Raewynne J. Whiteley, Canon Theologian

Ceaesarea Philippi

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples,
“Who do people say the Son of Man is?” (Matthew 6:13)

The people were along the shore

"Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge." (Mark 4:1)

Jesus went into the synagogue

"They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach." (Mark 1:21)

"...he went and lived in Capernaum ..."

"Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali." (Matthew 4:13)

2000 year old boat

Did this boat belong to Jesus and his disciples?

As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee

"As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen." (Matthew 4:18)

No more gloom

"Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the nations, by the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan—" (Isaiah 9:1).

Galilee (Tiberias)

Crossing the Sea of Galilee: "Some time after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the Sea of Galilee (that is, the Sea of Tiberias) . . . ," (John 6:1).

Our first full day of the pilgrimage.

Today, on the first full day of the pilgrimage we prayed through the holy
sites of Galilee.

We paused to pray at the site of the Beatitudes, and at Caparnaum the town in which Jesus began his ministry.

Special to this bishop, we stopped for noonday prayer on the shore of
the Sea of Galilee at the sight of the post-resurrection appearance
during which Jesus asked Peter, "Do you love me? . . .
Feed my sheep". This was the gospel read at my ordination as bishop.

“When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?’
‘Yes, Lord,’ he said, ‘you know that I love you.’
Jesus said, ‘Feed my lambs.’”

From the Gospel of John, chapter 21, verse 15.

This has been a great day; quite emotional as we crossed the Sea of Galilee
by boat singing and praying.

+ Bishop Larry

.

Sea of Galilee

The Rev. Canon Rob Picken of the Cathedral of the Incarnation, Garden City, proclaims the Word during the pilgrimage group's passage across the Sea of Galilee.