For right now, I am left clueless on how to answer people when they ask me, "How was your trip?" It was life changing, it was insightful, it was horrible, eye-opening, disheartening... the list could go on and on and will most definitely contradict itself. I'm glad I went, but I'm also not happy that I went, because I cannot unsee what I've seen. My perspective has changed, on a lot of things.
The biggest change has been my perspective on religious people. I can say, without a doubt, the universal truth is that religious people are the worst in the world. Whether they are claiming land given to them by God 2000 years ago, or fighting over who has Jesus' real tomb, they're all the same, terrible. I have never been so upset in my life about how the message of God, particularly that of Jesus Christ, has been distorted and used for one's own benefit more than in the 'Holy Land.' While the scenery was beautiful and I certainly had my God moments while I was there, this was one of the most unholy places I have ever been.
The simple fact that the 3 Abrahamic religions cannot live in peace is a disgrace to God. Let alone the infighting among Christians that literally trample all over Jesus' tomb. It is all contrary to the God I know. God does not love one people over another and no people are holier than another. We are ALL made in the image of God, and to treat anyone as less than holy, is treating God as such.
I am angry at how God is represented by the people of all faiths in Israel. Not everyone in Israel has it wrong, there are certainly people there spreading the message of love and justice to those who need to hear it. However, these people are a minority and are climbing Mt. Everest trying to rid Israel of it's ridiculousness.
I am not alone in my animosity towards the religious who get God wrong. This week in the lectionary, we hear from Paul, who was also upset about similar issues, and in that I find great comfort. 1 Corinthians 1:18-31:
"For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart."
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block for Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.
Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, but many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast n the Lord.""
