Santa's Ghetto

Luke 2:15 says:

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

So a group of us decided to be like shepherds, and walk to Bethlehem. It was Christmas Eve, not Christmas day, but never mind.

Cue the sheep....

As we crossed the checkpoint into Bethlehem, which is part of the West Bank today, we wondered to what extent our experience paralleled that of 1st century travelers en route to their hometowns during the census issued by Caesar Augustus. We had to walk through a checkpoint, which is basically soldiers at a post, checking IDs. We had to consider our safety - not to a large degree - but enough to realize we were in a politcally tense environment. Anyway, just some thoughts....here we are approaching the checkpoint.

Once inside, we walked for a distance along The Wall. You will hear it called the Security Fence, the Separation Wall - all kinds of things - depending on your political slant. Basically, its the controversial wall that is being constructed between Israel and the West Bank. Here is a piece of it...

As you can see, its covered with graffiti. During the Christmas Season, some additional artwork was added as part of a traveling exhibition called Santa's Ghetto. Here are some more pics of things we found on the wall, as well as artwork from the show.

As you can see, it was quite an interesting day in the town where Yeshua was born. Even in the main tourist spot - Manger Square - there was an odd sense of things. It was really crowded, and people were singing carols, and there was Christmas stuff to buy- but but was kind of a 'fake Christmas' feeling, compounded by the HEAVY security in the streets, snipers on rooftops, etc.

And here we are, in the midst of the madness!