Rising Meadow Farm and religious pluralism in the U.S.

I think I posted a link to this farm in a previous foodie post some weeks or months ago, but just in case, here it is again. Rising Meadow Farm is in this immediate region of the North Carolina Piedmont, a drive of an hour or two away, and it has beautiful sheep who give gorgeous wool, as you can see by clicking your way around. Very nice material for you knitters and weavers out there. It also has lambs who give their life for your dinner table. The farmers are appropriately grateful for both.

I was delighted to see on the package of stew meat I bought today (frozen - they do this with all the meat since there is local transportation involved) that the processing is done by a local halal institution. Halal, for those of you who don't know, is the Muslim equivalent of kosher: if a butcher is halal, this means it follows Muslim religious law, which, like Jewish religious law, has guidelines for the treatment of animals. Yes, this is all right here in North Carolina.

Want to read more about religious pluralism in the U.S.? Have a look at the website of the Pluralism Project, which I use in my course on the History of Religion in America (Religion 101, actually about 3/4 historical and 1/4 contemporary) here. If you don't have time for school, or even if you do, this is a great resource with pictures, primers on many religious traditions, recent news (updated daily) on religious issues in the U.S. especially from religions we don't tend to think of as "American" (though they now are), and other interesting religious matters. Hindus in the Boston suburbs! Muslims in Mississippi! Cambodian Buddhists in New Hampshire! Great visuals too. Enjoy and learn.

Photo (c) Cindy Brown, The Pluralism Project, 2003.
Masjid al-Halim, near Sumrall, Mississippi

As for the lamb (she says, feeling a little embarrassed to be de-vegetarianizing) I am probably going to save it for next weekend since it is frozen. It is stew meat and I have made great stews in the past with my grandmother's stew recipe which Mother of Acts of Hope reconstructed for me, but it is not quite stew season. I bought the meat because it was cheaper than chops or rack of lamb and other cuts not quite within reach of my budget. It is from such a good source, though, that I can probably grill it just fine. I will probably marinate it first. Stay tuned. For now, I'm eating tomato salad and goat cheese on whole grain bread. The corn, by the way, was very good, though not quite as good as Vermont corn, but I have a Vermont bias in matters of corn on the cob.

Interfaith peace delegation to Iran - and a woman rabbi speaks in Tehran

My friend Ethan Vesely-Flad, who works for the Fellowship of Reconciliation and with whom I helped start the East Bay chapter of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship some years ago when we were both living in the San Francisco Bay Area (East Bay means Berkeley, Oakland, and environs), is in Iran with an interfaith peace delegation.

You read that right, Iran. One of the members of the delegation is Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb and she recently stood before an Orthodox Jewish congregation in Tehran, a historical first.

Ethan, who edits FOR's magazine, Fellowship, is reporting on the trip. You can read about it on the FOR blog here.

Make sure you click the "read more" words so you can read the full stories. The home page of the blog just shows the first paragraph of each blog entry. Read the one about Lynn under "Climbing mountains, making history." (Direct link to the story here.)

Blogging will be scarce in this space for a few days again while I take some more writing time to work on a Big Theological Tome (and also on the required year-end reports - more of the romantic life of academe), but Ethan's writing is much more worthy of your attention right now than my writing, so enjoy and ponder.

It's worth exploring the whole FOR homepage and links too. Scroll all the way down on that page, there is a wealth of information.

A few prayers for the interfaith delegation wouldn't hurt, either.

Italy and Turkey and "R and R"

No, not that kind of R&R. Alas. But a very interesting article by my Mediterranean brother, once again a comparative piece on Turkey and Italy. An earlier Turkey-Italy piece is linked here. The latest, just in, is here. Don't blame my brother for the wiggy punctuation, I think they have a bad copyeditor at the Turkish Daily News.


In case you've forgotten where all those Mediterranean countries are, here is a map.

For more instructive and fun geography, visit my buddy Paul, the Byzigenous Buddhapalian.

Friday cat blogging and Haghia Sophia

So, I walked into Haghia Sophia (an earlier post tells me it was on December 13) and there, in the penumbra, was a cat. Right there in the church-turned-mosque-turned-museum, HUGE (the building, not the cat), dark and cavernous and ill-lit in the entrance, then glorious with its high, high vaults and windows and walls of marble and Byzantine icons and Arabic inscriptions. The two cat photos are lousy, but just so you know there really is at least one cat in Haghia Sophia, here they are.

Below them, though, are photos of some of the other sights. Mostly I didn't take pictures. I figured there were better photographs in books and online, and for the most part the things I wanted to photograph were too high or too far away or not really accessible or too large for the lens I had. Also, I spent the first hour or so looking up with my mouth hanging open because the place was so amazing, so I doubt I'd have been capable of taking photos. My second hour there, or some part of a second hour, I recovered a bit and took these few pictures. Some are, as you will see below, photos of photos.

There is scaffolding in Haghia Sophia. There is almost always scaffolding there. It's an old building and an architectural miracle, so something always needs repair or threatens to collapse unless it's held up by something.




By clicking the links above, you will see photos that give you a little sense of the vast space. With my camera, I only took close-ups. Haghia Sophia is even bigger than you can imagine. The Byzantines never built anything close to that size again.

I've already posted a photo of the tile below, but I want you to get a sense of sequence in which I saw and photographed.



Many kinds of marble were shipped here to make the walls. (Remember, this is back in the 6th century, so we're not talking freight trains.) This was just one among many of the marble slabs, though one of the most beautiful.


I went upstairs after this. To get to the second floor, you walk up a corridor that winds around and still has what looks like the original pavement and walls.


I kept imagining, both on the bottom floor and as I walked up this corridor, what liturgy must have been like here. The robes, the incense, the processions.

All men, of course.

The Empress and her ladies sat upstairs, in a special gallery with a balcony.

I imagined what it might have been like to walk to the upper floor in this very corridor, on these very stones.

That's not a dead end. The corridor turns left when you get to that wall in front of you.


In one of the upper galeries was a photo exhibit. This isn't as ridiculous as it sounds. The upper walls of Haghia Sophia have magnificent mosaics (icons made of mosaic really), but you can't see them up close. With the help of some sort of fabulous photographic technology and maybe some scaffolding, a photographer whose name I don't have handy made this set of pictures of the mosaics. The curators then put them up in light glass or plexiglas frames so that they would have the real thing just behind them and you could thus get the best possible perspective on the mosaics. So I took photos of the photos.

This here is the Theotokos with Emperor John II Comnenus and Empress Irene, his wife. (There was more than one royal Irene in Byzantium. This is not Irene the Icon Queen --not her real title-- who lived many centuries before.) The mosaic dates from the early 12th century.

Then we've got someone who looks like John the Baptizer, but I must check. Sorry for the flash, but it was dark dark dark in there.


And here again is Herself.


After the fall of Byzantium in 1453, Haghia Sofia became a mosque, so it has minarets, and this is a view of one of them from the outside yard.


An ablution fountain, which I have mentioned before, is outdoors. It is not used since this place is now a museum, but it was for the use of the worshippers at the mosque, and there are many like it, though much less ornate, around town in other mosque courtyards.





And then there was a not too happy looking cat in a corner, outside either Haghia Sophia or the Blue Mosque. It looks cold to me. It was a grey rainy day. The cat inside Haghia Sophia was happier, sheltered under the great vaults and clearly at home in the building. I don't know what this business is in Orham Pamuk's memoir about packs of dogs roaming around Istanbul. I saw cats, cats, and more cats.

Yes, there was Friday cat blogging (and various things on illness, ordination of women, Brigid, Candlemas, et al.)

Scroll down beyond the lament post below. Mrrrrowwww.

Me, I have been sick and stressed out. (The former doubtless influenced by the latter. Stress has been there for several weeks. Sickness crept up on me a day or two ago.) Not too badly sick, but trying to fend off something coldish or lungish or fluish. I have been taking homeopathic remedies and I slept all morning. (The same morning I was supposed to spend working to meet a major writing deadline after canceling a diocesan meeting I usually chair. But first things first.)

We have three finalists coming to town for a position in our department (Religious Studies, very small department, three and a half people, the half being an adjunct, so only three full-time tenure-track people). One came this past week -- intense visit as these always are (the poor candidate has to give a talk and be interviewed by two or three groups and about six or eight individuals one on one; my colleague Eric and I remember this all too well since he is only in his 4th year here and I in my 3d) but very good. All three candates are excellent. The next arrives Sunday night. The next the following Sunday night.

The position is in Islamic Studies and Social Ethics. We are a small department and everyone does more than one thing. But we are weighting the Islam training and teaching more heavily here.

Mercifully, classes are going well, much better than last semester. I know the material much better, I'm not hopelessly behind on returning written work, and there are fewer, um, challenging students. (Don't you love it when I understate? Must stay diplomatic. I do love my students but some absorb more energy than others.) But there is too much going on and unfortunately I cannot tell any of it to go away. The closest I came to that was deferring this morning's diocesan Anti-Racism Committee meeting till later this month - but that came at a price since I don't make such decisions without my executive committee and then one has to contact people (just writing isn't enough, you have to confirm everyone got the note) and make sure they don't show up at a church in the middle of the state and find no one there, etc etc. So that all takes time, though I had some help. And then I decided to take care of myself, and there went the morning. I am better but still not a happy puppy.

I also had to stay up writing a few little things because last night at midnight was the deadline for recommendations for applications to master's degrees at Harvard Divinity School and four of our best students are applying and I'd only finished one of the recommendations. And this is not something on which one does a sloppy job since we're talking people's lives and education here. I am very proud of my little darlings - not just of these but of the ones who are headed for service projects and nonprofit work after they graduate this coming spring. We have an unusual number of altruistic students at this college, many of them in our department. Some of them, in fact, are the same applying for further study; they want to use their education to serve others. So I stayed up writing essays about how fabulous and creative these youngsters are, and fortunately these days you can upload the essays and fill in all the check-this and rate-that part online. But it's still work.

So I have been a little overwhelmed. Those of you who pray, please send a few prayers my way.

P.S. Maya Pavlova acted like a hellion this noon after I woke up and tried to apply her monthly dose of anti-flea stuff. I have the scratches to prove it.

P.P.S. Happy Candlemas! And happy Brigid Day plus one! I have fallen down on the job in the saints department. For a fine Brigid reflection, see here. Some scholars and several tellers of stories (sometimes the same people) view Brigid as an ordained bishop. Abbesses and abbots had authority often equal to that of a bishop. So either answer may be correct :-). Most recent thing I have read in this general area is by the eminent scholar (and all-around great guy) Gary Macy in his recent Santa Clara Lecture, which I just got in the mail recently. His related and latest book (from Oxford University Press, if you please) is on the ordination of women in early medieval Europe. (You read that right.) But I have to go have some herbal tea. Talk amongst yourselves.

Friday cat blogging: Chora cat

Chora Church, a.k.a. Holy Saviour in the Country, a.k.a. Kariye Müzesi, Kariye Camii, or Kariye Kilisesi (the Chora Museum, Mosque or Church) is the church with the beautiful Byzantine mosaics, as beautiful as Haghia Sophia in its own way. I spent two hours there. Behind the church, of course, there was a cat. Istanbul, city of cats.

Chora Cat. Photo by Jane Redmont. Click to enlarge.

The back of the church looks like this:

Behind Chora. Photos by Jane Redmont. Istanbul, December 2007.

"Ferry to Chalcedon" post preview, and quick Senate vote roundup

Swamped again... Sigh.

To the left and below are a few preview photos of my two trips to the Asian side of the Bosphorus. The tale with photos (these and many others) in proper chronological order is under construction.

I am NOT listening to the State of the Onion. I will read it when it's over.



Cloture vote on FISA. Good. For updates on the scoundrel scene, see friends' posts here (Mimi) and here (Buddhapalian) and here (Buddhapalian again, on a not unrelated matter). Longish but worth it.





That's the view from the outdoor deck of the ferry. I froze my fingers taking it just for you.

Friday cat blogging: cats in a mosque courtyard

This was a prelude to the cats of Chalcedon. It was quite the multireligious trip to Istanbul and environs.

These cats will appear again (as will the Chalcedon cats) in the forthcoming, much awaited, really and truly finally happening, leisurely tale of The Ferry to Chalcedon, coming to you this weekend! Yay! One faculty committee meeting this afternoon (on the day I am not supposed to be on campus, but that's when the chair scheduled it) and then I get to work at home with the local feline and try to hatch deep theological thoughts and coherent sentences. (A very good week on the teaching front though -- I think this semester is going to be more pleasant than the last. Thank heavens.)

Click the photo for close-up and details.

P.S. Oh geez, I just realized I already posted this on January 4. Academe is frying my brain. Someone take me back to parish work! (Right - and that will fix my brain for sure.) I'm leaving these felines here because they were handsome three weeks ago and they're handsome now. And I have to get ready for my committee meeting.

Cats in Mosque Courtyard, Uskudur, Turkey. Photo by Jane Redmont.

Blogging may be a little scarce for a few days, but there is a lot to read below...

I need to take a little time off from being chatty, so bear with me (and pray for me) for a few days. Plenty to read and look at below since I was overly loquacious during the holidays.

And there will be more pictures and catch-up tales of Istanbul soon. Including one gorgeous mosque picture. Okay, here's a preview.* We'll revisit this place when I am back in circulation. Peace out.

* Yes, slanted on purpose so it would all fit in. Tilt your head, please. Click to enlarge.

Mosque and fishers in Ortakoy, December sunset. Photo: Jane Redmont

Friday cat blogging: more Turkish felines

Cats in a mosque courtyard, Uskudur, Turkey.

Uskudur is a municipality right next to the Asian section of Istanbul, on the other side of the Bosphorus from where I was staying, and has a famous mosque which a couple of French friends and I visited. I noticed the cats outside, of course. Click to enlarge and see detail. Handsome creatures.

Istanbul photos: ablution fountain, Starbucks

Mosques have fountains where worshippers wash their feet and hands and face and perform other ritual ablutions before going to pray. I only saw men at these fountains.

This particular one was not in use.

Click on these two photos for detail and note the beautiful Arabic calligraphy at the top of the second one.

A couple of minutes' walk from Haghia Sophia (which was first a church, then a mosque, and is now a museum) is the tram on a very touristy street with, you guessed it and you see it, Starbucks.

Chaldean Catholics in Iraq - Muslims and Christians

Outside Mar Eliya church, not much had changed since last Christmas: Concrete blocks still surround the building and guards check the IDs of those entering. But inside, hundreds of Iraqi worshipers - Christians and Muslims - were crammed into the overflowing Chaldean Catholic church Tuesday, celebrating the holiday and the fact that they felt safe enough to venture out of their homes to attend Christmas Mass.

"Last year was the year of misery, desperation and sadness," said Samar Jorge Gorges. "But this year is better. So many people attend the Mass and you can see that their praying was joyful."

Cardinal Emmanuel III Delly, the patriarch of Iraq's ancient Chaldean Church said Mass, appealing for peace and unity across the war-scarred country.

"Iraq is like a garden and its beauty is the variety of its flowers and scent," Delly said during the service.

Among those attending were several Shiite Muslim sheiks, including Raad Tamimi, who said they had come "in solidarity with our Christian brothers . . . to plant the seed of love again in the new Iraq." Tamimi, a tribal leader, was excited to shake the cardinal's hand and asked that a photo be taken with his cellphone.

Many thanks to MadPriest for the story and the link.

Full story at the L.A. Times. They will make you sign up if you aren't already registered on the Los Angeles Times site, but it's free and they've never sent me spam. (I can't say the same for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.)

O God of all peace,
whose child Jesus healed the sick
and walked with the suffering,
we thank you for your Spirit,
present among your people in Iraq.
We beg you
who have kindled the flame of love
in their hearts
to keep them strong
in you,
through Christ Jesus, saviour. Amen.

A city of contrasts

Yesterday afternoon: Haghia Sophia, with the tourists. Huge, astounding former church, former mosque, now museum. Imagining Orthodox liturgies resounding under the domes and clouds of incense wafting from huge censors carried by heavily robed clergy.

Photo: inside the Blue Mosque (photo by Temeraire.org)
Then the "Blue" Sultan Ahmet Mosque, where like everyone else I took off my shoes and like all the women covered my head with a scarf. Vast, carpeted, domed also. Men kneeling in the main space, women behind screens in the back.

Yesterday evening: holiday party for Turkcell, the biggest cell phone company in town (my host does business with them and had to make an appearance). No headscarves, no stockinged feet.
Little black dresses, suits and ties, sushi and smoked salmon and Iranian meat pastries, a very young crowd (the average employee age is 27), rock music in the background.

Today: a Sufi service, not the made-for-tourists whirling dervishes but the real thing, in an upper room (Sufism isn't legal here, though it isn't persecuted either), with forty people sitting on cushions, intent, gentle, reverent, chanting, in a decidedly un-tourist neighborhood. (How did I end up there? I have friends in town who are connected with this community and who invited me.)

I will write more about the great divide here. Deep secularists and strict religious practitioners. And then those, fewer, who live on bridges and cross over, now and again or on a daily basis.

Advent Chagall series: Hagar in the Desert

Francis follow-up: Saint Francis and the Sultan

I promised more Francis fare, and here it is.

This comes from a New York Times op-ed from last Christmas Day by Thomas Cahill. I first heard the story in a sermon for the feast of St. Francis two years ago. So yes, the encounter between Francis and the Sultan really did happen. Read the op-ed here.

If the link won't work, please let me know and I will do a cut and paste job. The link works for me, but I have one of those login thingies --don't you love it when I talk tech?-- with the Times.


In the same vein, here is a meditation on Francis and the Sultan by Jesuit peace activist John Dear.

Here is another by a freelance Catholic writer, Wendy Hoke.

A French sort of week(end): Saint Louis a.k.a. Louis IX

Today is the feast of Louis IX. He is never known as Louis IX in France; you always learn about him and talk about him as "Saint Louis," though everyone knows he is Louis IX because in elementary school you learn all your kings and queens and who was the son of whom and the wife of whom and (very important) the mother of whom and (as I noted yesterday) the mistress of whom.

In this case the mother was important, because Saint Louis (pronounced the French way, not the Missouri way) was only 12 when he became king, so like several other kings of France, he had a regent, that is, someone who did most of the governing in his stead, and in his case it was Blanche of Castille, whose name we learned at the same time as her saintly son's. We never did, now that I think of it, learn who his wife was. My memories of Saint Louis are: Blanche of Castille, the Sainte-Chapelle (Louis had it built to house a piece of the true cross and the crown of thorns), Crusades, the building of a famous hospital for the poor and blind, and death from typhoid in 1270 -- and also the fact that he wasn't entirely what one might think of as a saint. Then again, neither were a lot of other saints. But he did sound rather military and most of the other saints did not.
So let's go to the Daily Office bio for a little catch-up. There are errors in there in the French spelling, and I know I am being picky, but Americans who bungle French spelling, on restaurant menus or in historical biographies, or even when trying to be funny, get me irritated. (Ask PeaceBang, with whom I got all huffy (under my Beauty Tips for Ministers pseudonym), and yes of course PB and I are still friends.) I'm a grammar and spelling nut in English too, but there is something about the U.S. messing up of French that drives me particularly crazy. Psychoanalyze that -- I'm not going to bother. At any rate, the bio by James Kiefer is quite interesting as usual, but I have to note the proper spelling of the French cities of Limoges (which has an s at the end) and Périgueux (not Périgeux, which changes the pronunciation) and the province of Roussillon (two ss), from which there are some fine hearty red wines, as Dennis the wine maven will know.

The bio notes what I only vaguely remembered: that Louis was just and wise and had a mix of military valor and personal holiness. My students are always fascinated by the Crusades and by the new military orders (as in religious orders) that arose at the time: how did Christianity come to endorse violence and honor conquest? How did religious orders, which back in the days of Benedict, had almost exclusively been a sanctuary from fighting, expand to include warriors? What fervor for the holy places where Jesus walked drove the Crusaders? How to study the mix of faith, material greed, opportunism, and self-sacrifice present in the Crusades? What were relations with Muslims and Jews like and why? Why and how the killing? Were there friendly encounters as well? Louis's life contains, if not answers, at least illustrations for some of these questions. As a king, he did a great deal of good. I love Kiefer's accounts of Louis' friendships with Robert de Sorbon (yes, the Sorbonne was named after him) and Thomas Aquinas. His was a period of great intellectual and artistic ferment and creativity. One of the answers.com biographies notes that Louis ordered the expulsion of the Jews from France and had many copies of the Talmud burned: he was, alas but inevitably, a man of his time. (Note: the king who ordered the more strict and pervasive expulsion of the Jews was Louis' grandson, Philippe. See this account by the BBC researchers, a little more reliable than answers.com and well worth the read.)

Louis' life reminds us of the strength and subtlety required of those who rule, of the place of self-sacrifice in the exercise of power, of the complexities of every age especially when there is war and social chaos (which he managed not only to contain but to reduce), of the exercise of government with compassion, of the blind spots of all great people, and of an era with whose legacies we still live, in Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, and beyond: yes, here in the Americas too.

From San Francisco, more serious social and political analysis

Again, I can't say enough good things about janinsanfran of Happening Here.

Every day this past week, she has written and posted a piece on national or international politics, including human rights and the presidential race in the U.S. She presents both facts and commentary and helps her readers ask questions that even the better news programs don't put before us. She's been doing this long before this week, of course, but this week has been particularly rich. I have yet to catch up on my reading at her blog, but I've skimmed her entries of the last ten days and I recommend them all. Do have a look.

Recent posts include:

**Two posts on Rwanda based on Canadian Lt. General Romeo Dallaire's recent book Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda: here and here.

**A book review of Mike Davis's book Planet of Slums and Jan's related reflections, with a reference to the work of Franz Hinkelammert, whose work I know a tiny bit in relation to both U.S. Latina and Latin American (and other Third World) theologians.

**Presidential qualifications: the "authenticity" test and other matters, like calm in the face of terror. (That's presidential as in POTUS and the U.S. presidential campaign.)

**Also re: the presidential campaign, the place of the English-only issue. And of the war in Iraq.

**A tribute to recently deceased --at far too young an age-- political blogger Steve Gilliard of The News Blog.

**And then there was the imam held at the U.S.-Canadian border. Read about him here.

**Just a little farther back, there was a post on something called the Global Peace Index. There are some interesting comments there, too.

As her name indicates, janinsanfran also posts on local culture, society, and politics here in the Bay Area, particularly in the city of San Francisco where she and her partner live. (Some examples: here and here.)

Once in a while, there are bird pictures and other beauties of nature, too.

Also adventures in clearing logs and taking care of trails.

This is a lot of material, but you can keep it around as a reference or read it bit by bit. You won't regret it.

Friends across faiths, races, and years

Velveteen Rabbi, whose blog I love but don’t read often enough, has a moving item about an interfaith friendship.

It’s based on an article from the Washingtonian about an Orthodox Jewish rabbi and an Orthodox Muslim (who happens to be the brother of comedian David Chappelle).

Always good to read these little bits of hope.

Algernon on Nancy Pelosi's headscarf

My friend Algernon (stage actor, complete with Equity card, and dharma teacher, complete with solid Zen practice) has a great comment on the whole flap about Nancy Pelosi's visit to a mosque during her recent trip to Syria. Read it here -- and sorry, Algernon, for not reading you more often. Haven't forgotten you, buddy. Up on the blogroll you go. Rock on. Many bows.

Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem: A Good Friday Meditation for the Way of the Cross

St. Mary's House, Greensboro has a wonderful custom on Good Friday. In the evening, we pray the Way of the Cross (a.k.a. Stations of the Cross) and a different person is responsible for each of the 14 meditations. Most people do something spoken, but there are always a few people who offer a musical meditation, with or without words, and once in a while there is dance or visual art (last year this was in the form of a slide show). There are different views of the death of Jesus and different theologies of suffering and redemption, tied together by the simple service with prayers and silence. At the end we receive communion from the reserved Sacrament.

From the shortest and simplest to the most complex, all the meditations are beautiful and moving and in some cases very, very powerful. Lay people do most of the speaking. All fourteen people put time and care and prayer into composing their meditation. We are a small congregation -- tonight about half the people in attendance were those offering a meditation; they ranged in age from a little over 20 years old to a little under 80. An inspiring, humbling experience that helped focus us all on Jesus, suffering, death, betrayal, justice, human responsibility, and divine accompaniment and presence.

I am among the long-winded -- the curse of the theologically educated. Below is my meditation. It's a little hard to convey the feel of it just in writing, since I sang a portion of it a capella and the melody is really haunting. It's Eastern European Jewish music but it is also reminiscent of some of the tones one hears in both Arab and Israeli music. The words are in Yiddish -- it's a lullaby from the Vilna Ghetto, ca. 1942.

(The congregation didn't receive a translation of course, just the song as sung, but I'll put the translation below for you, since you can't hear the tune or the sound of the words. Also, this blog doesn't indent paragraphs (or if it does, I haven't figured out how) so I am using different colors instead, and space to mark some of the silences. I read this slowly and in some cases dramatically, so you' have to imagine the voice inflections.)

The Gospel passage is from Luke, chapter 23.

***********************************

Station VIII:

Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem


27A great number of the people followed him, and among them were women who were beating their breasts and wailing for him. 28But Jesus turned to them and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.”

[E]s dremlen feygle oyf di tsvaygn,

Shlof mayn tayer kind.

Bay dayn vigl, oyf dayn nare

Zitst a fremder un zingt:
Bay dayn vigl, oyf dayn nare

Zitst a fremder un zingt:
Lyu-lyu, lyu-lyu, lyu.

*********************

S'iz dayn vigl vu geshtanen

Oysgeflokhtn fun glik.

Un dayn mame, oy dayn mame,

Kumt shoyn keyn mol nit tsurik.
Un dayn mame, oy dayn mame,

Kumt shoyn keyn mol nit tsurik.
Lyu-lyu, lyu-lyu, lyu.

Kh'hob gezen dayn tatn loyfn

Unter hogl fun shteyn,

Iber felder iz gefloygn

Zayn faryosemter geveyn.
Iber felder iz gefloygn

Zayn faryosemter geveyn.
Lyu-lyu, lyu-lyu, lyu.

A great number of the people followed him, and among them were women who were beating their breasts and wailing for him. 28But Jesus turned to them and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. 29For the days are surely coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’ 30Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us’; and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ 31For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

***********************

I am Aviva, an Israeli Jew. My name, Aviva, means “spring.” My grandparents came here from Europe. On Good Friday, in Lithuania, the mobs would come and kill the Jews. My grandparents escaped, before the Nazis and their camps. They came here. In their lifetime and in my parents’ lifetime, and mine, there have been wars in every generation, on this small slip of land. Three years ago, my son was killed in a bomb attack on a bus in Jerusalem. Since then I have not slept a full night.

A great number of the people followed him, and among them were women who were beating their breasts and wailing for him. But Jesus turned to them and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children."

I am Habiba, a Palestinian Muslim. My name, Habiba, means “beloved.” My niece in Gaza has a heart defect. She must get to the doctor, but there are checkpoints, and travel restrictions, and she and her mother cannot get through. Her father has no work. What will happen to her? She is only ten. Her older brother is in prison. My son, their cousin, seethes with anger. I fear for him, for what he might do, for what might befall him. And now there is a wall separating us from friends and family, right here, in Jerusalem.

For the days are surely coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us’; and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

I am Sahar. I am a Greek Orthodox Christian and a Palestinian. My name, Sahar, means “awakening” or “dawn.” Not long ago, the army bulldozers uprooted my family’s olive groves to clear land for the Separation wall. The people weep. The land weeps. Some of my relatives are educated people, scholars and merchants; most of them have emigrated. I am thinking of leaving too, but my family has lived on this land for generations. Will we ever all return to Jerusalem?

‘s dremlen feygle oyf di tsvaygn,

Shlof mayn tayer kind.

Bay dayn vigl, oyf dayn nare

Zitst a fremder un zingt:
Bay dayn vigl, oyf dayn nare

Zitst a fremder un zingt:
Lyu-lyu, lyu-lyu, lyu.

I am Aviva. With other women, I monitor the behavior of my country’s soldiers at checkpoints. I will not forget the other mothers. I work as I weep.

I am Habiba. I teach young children. I will not let hate claim a victory. I work as I weep.

I am Sahar. I am a physician. I divide my time between the hospital and speaking tours. I work as I weep.

We work as we weep.

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We know each other.

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Some people call us traitors and whores.

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We are not going away.

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Our eyes ache and sting from tears.

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Still we stand here.

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Daughters of Jeru