The Rt. Rev. Andrew Asbil has written a letter to his diocese asking “our leaders” (politicians, presumably) to urge for a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.
What does this really mean, one wonders. It can’t mean that he wants pressure put on Hamas to release the Jewish hostages and surrender. That would produce an immediate ceasefire; if he meant that, he would say so.
The only other possibility is that he wants Israel to stop the war before it is won, leaving Hamas intact, guaranteeing further atrocities against the Jewish people. That, after all, is what Hamas has promised, although Asbil seems to think it would result in everyone joining hands and warbling I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing In Perfect Harmony. Maybe that’s what the Jews at the music festival were singing shortly before they were murdered, raped, beheaded, tortured and carted off as hostages.
So he doesn’t want a ceasefire at all; he wants Israel to lose its war against Hamas.
If bishops must insist on meddling in politics, I do wish that they would occasionally choose the right side.
Read it all here:
Dear Friends,
For the last 216 days, the first item on our news has been about war in the Land of the Holy One. The scenes of destruction, human suffering and sorrow leave an indelible mark on all of us. In the face of it all, it is tempting to turn away and say, “We can do so little; what can we do?”
The Anglican Church of Canada keeps this Sunday as Jerusalem Sunday. It reminds us that we all have a special relationship with the Land of the Holy One, and we are called to pray for its peace. Canadians have a particular bond of friendship with the Diocese of Jerusalem: the Diocese of Ottawa is its companion diocese, and Archbishop Hosam Naoum is a dear friend of our Church. Many of us have had the privilege of visiting St. George’s College in Jerusalem for a pilgrimage course and have met, learned about and witnessed the experience of Palestinian Christians in the Middle East.
The incessant violence and warfare in Israel and Gaza is overwhelming in its statistics: 1,100 Israelis and 34,000 Palestinians dead since Oct. 7, 2023, and 1.7 million people displaced in a humanitarian crisis, with emergency aid agencies unable to cope with the need and unable to cross the access points.
Enough is enough.
Calls for a ceasefire are increasing internationally, and I join with those who are crying out: the time for a cessation of violence is past due.
Bishop Riscylla, Bishop Kevin and I will be participating in parts of the Gaza Ceasefire Pilgrimage in Toronto this weekend, organized by KAIROS. This global movement of walking (or rolling) in prayerful solidarity with the people of Gaza will help raise awareness, raise money for humanitarian aid, and hopefully exert pressure on our leaders to urge a ceasefire now.
The Bishop’s position does not seem to take into account the Israelis’ security challenges, to put it mildly. Virtue effortlessly acquired at the expense of those realities!
The bishop is contending for a ceasefire- in a bid to end the ongoing slaughter of innocent persons being perpetrated against an identifiable minority group within the State of Israel jurisdiction. Israel may have ongoing security issues with Hamas but the act of genocide will serve only to make it worse.
I may not give a fig newton about other views espoused by the Bishop of Toronto but I agree, 100 per cent with the stance concerning Gaza and a cease-fire.
It would indeed be goof if a ceasefire could be accomplished but it must be remembered that the Palestinians started the war.
Did God give the land of Palestine permanently to the Jews? If the answer is “Yes”, then, why would God allow Solomon’s Temple to be destroyed in 586 BC, and Herod’s Temple to be destroyed in AD 70 within a generation of Jesus’ death on the cross? The Holy Temple in Jerusalem has never been rebuilt. In other words, with no blood sacrifice today, the Jews have no lawful way of atoning for their sin. The Jews and the Palestinians need to lay down their arms and turn to Jesus, the Saviour of all humankind.
You have it exactly right, Michael. The modern State of Israel is a secular state propped up with American money. There are some of genuine Jewish ancestry there. I, Jewish in the maternal line, enjoy, with all others who have accepted Jesus as my Messiah, no ‘right of return’ thither. In any case, how is it feasible that we could all be accommodated in that small area? There are and have been for millennia millions upon millions of us!
Jn. 4, the Epistle to the Hebrews and indeed the whole NT should be read in this connection. The Church is Israel now, and has been since the Lord rose from the dead.
That doesn’t mean that I ought to be sentimental about terrorist movements either. How many who are currently making public fools of themselves have actually read the Koran? In ANY language? Noticed the misogyny?
One may, I believe, espouse, and in conformity with
the Christian Gospel, a view that no one should have
a positively discriminatory right, denied to others,
based solely on who one’s ancestors were. (Call,
if it helps, an assertion of such a right “ancestrism”,
in the same genus as sexism, racism, etc.)
Such a view is, significantly, opposed to Zionism.
It is also, for example, significantly opposed to
how people identified as “indigenous”/”First Nations” are given rights denied to those not so
identified.
Of course, in a culture steeped in identity politics,
one has to be cautious in expressing such a view.
Being opposed to Zionism might well evoke a
charge of “antisemitism”. A parallel in the case
of my second example can be left as an exercise
for the reader who lives in Canada.
A choice of one of the four Classical Virtues –
Courage. Prudence. Temperance, and Justice –
strings to mind. Whatever the choice, subsume
it under Speak Truth to Power, but recall the
adage about the first casualty of war.
Since The Anglican Church in Canada’s July, 2019, General Synod’s (Vancouver, BC) abdication of our LORD Jesus Christ’s Great Commission of The Gospel to both Jews and Muslims, their moral authority for pursing a true and lasting Peace + Ephesians 2 is gravely weighed in the balances and found wanting. KAIROS was defunded by the Harper Federal Government for its proven ties to Hamas. Nor does the current Triumvirate of pro-Hamas unilateral declaration of the fictional “State” of “Palestine” expunge their pro Third Reich WWII record. Was D-Day really 75 years ago?
The church didn’t call for a cease fire as the allied forces neared Berlin.