wfn.org | A Message to the Episcopal Church - All Saints Day, 2000

[ENS@ecunet.org]

http://www.ecusa.anglican.org/ens

2000-188

A Message to the Episcopal Church - All Saints Day, 2000

     Dear friends in Christ:

     I write with a heavy heart, knowing that people on all sides of the 
difficult questions in the Middle East are grieving as the violence continues. I 
have remained in regular communication over these last weeks with our bishop in 
the Diocese of Jerusalem, the Right Reverend Riah H. Abu El-Assal. He has 
appealed to us to observe a time of prayer for our church in the Holy Land and 
for all the people in the region. I want to assure our Palestinian sisters and 
brothers that we are profoundly aware of their suffering, frustration and anger.

     I call upon the whole church to join in intentional prayer from now through 
Christmas Day, praying for a genuine and abiding peace in the Holy Land, and for 
the presence of God's unfailing love with those who have suffered through this 
conflict over the last decades.

     My prayer is that the people who live in the Holy Land and confess the three 
Abrahamic faiths - Judaism, Christianity and Islam - will find a way to live 
together with mutual trust. I ask that we join our prayers with the prayers of 
Jews, Christians and Muslims.

     All congregations in our Church have received information about Jerusalem 
2000 and our participation in this Anglican Communion effort to raise funds. Our 
hope is to raise $2.5 million in the Episcopal Church to support the 
infrastructure of our Church institutions, especially the hospitals and schools, 
in the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East. Given the situation, 
this effort is particularly timely.

     Further, I commend for study and reflection, the booklet and video entitled 
Peacemaking in the Holy Land which lays out the concerns and actions of our 
church in partnership with the diocese and people of the church in the Holy Land. 
This material is available from Parish Services.

     The remembrance of the birth of Jesus will bear a special poignancy this 
coming Christmas as we turn our faces towards Bethlehem. May this year's 
celebration of the Nativity see the fulfillment of the promise to be found in the 
birth of the Prince of Peace.

     Faithfully in Christ,

     Frank T. Griswold

     Presiding Bishop and Primate

     The Episcopal Church, USA