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BLOOD BROTHERS
Elias Chacour
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3-time Nobel Peace Prize-nominated Catholic priest Father Elias Chacour was born in British Mandate Palestine in 1939. In Blood Brothers, Father Elias Chacour shares his personal story of inexplicable human suffering and his decision to respond to the out-of-control turmoil in his life, and in the region, with Jesus Christ’s path of reconciliation and peace.
Father Elias Chacour begins Blood Brothers (first published in 1982) by describing his childhood in the hills of upper Galilee in the 1930s. He was a 9-year-old boy when the Middle East was completely transformed in 1948 and in the book, he asks the questions that any child would ask: When can I go home? Do you want us to be your lips and hands and feet to bring peace again?
You can use my hands and feet. Even my tongue.
Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour
Elias was sent to school in Haifa with instructions from his father to “learn how to reconcile enemies, how to turn hatred into peace.” Images of this peace kept recurring in young Elias’ mind who knew that following Jesus’ teachings was the only way to make peace happen. For Elias, this meant attending seminary. Nineteen year old Elias had graduated from minor seminary in Nazareth, and had his heart set on attending seminary in Jerusalem. But, this was not easy in the region he lived in. So he was sent to seminary in Saint Sulpice in Paris instead.
In Europe, Elias pondered Palestinian identity, learned of the persecution of the Jewish people, and came closer to understanding how he would serve God – as a peacemaker. From transforming a church and entire community in Ibillin to interacting with his fellow pupils from the region in Hebrew University, Father Elias Chacour began to preach the Christian message of peace and reconciliation to a global audience increasingly moved to listen to the rare voice of a Palestinian Christian.
Jews and Palestinians are brothers – blood brothers. We share the same father, Abraham, and the same God. We must never forget that.
Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour
I understand that this topic is a “no-go area” because the conflict still exists. Just looking at this book might confuse or even infuriate some people. But for those looking for a personal understanding of this conflict from a Christian’s point of view, this book can help people understand what a Christian solution to conflict should look like.
Former United States Secretary of State, James A. Baker (in George H.W. Bush’s administration) writes the afterword to ‘Blood Brothers: The Dramatic Story of a Palestinian Christian Working for Peace in Israel’.
PRAYER
Dear Jesus, in the land of your birth, life, death and resurrection, and in the land of the early Church, it seems that there is everything but peace. Many of us have not been in this situation, so we cannot understand what those living in the region are going through. So, we borrow the prayer that Elias Chacour’s mother prayed in the 1940s: “Forgive them, oh God. Heal their pain. Remove their bitterness. Let us show them your peace.” In Jesus’ name, amen.
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DID YOU KNOW?
Father Elias Chacour was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize three times – in 1986, 1989 and 1994. In the early 1970s, he organized a non-violent peace march in Galilee with Bishop Joseph Raya, a friend of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.