{"id":62167,"date":"2023-11-01T14:27:00","date_gmt":"2023-11-01T18:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/insidethevatican.com\/?p=62167"},"modified":"2023-12-22T16:41:47","modified_gmt":"2023-12-22T21:41:47","slug":"jerusalem-patriarch-pizzaballa-offers-himself-as-hostage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/insidethevatican.com\/magazine\/jerusalem-patriarch-pizzaballa-offers-himself-as-hostage\/","title":{"rendered":"Jerusalem Patriarch Pizzaballa Offers Himself as Hostage"},"content":{"rendered":"
By ITV staff\/CNA<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n On October 7, Hamas led the deadliest militant attack in Israel\u2019s history, with an Israeli death toll at more than 1400. Israel then launched its heaviest-ever airstrikes on Gaza, a long-blockaded territory with about 2.3 million Palestinian residents.<\/p>\n Since then, Israel, declaring \u201cwar\u201d on the militant Islamic organization, has continued to retaliate, leaving Palestinian citizens injured, killed and driven from their homes with no water, food, medicines or electricity allowed into their territory.<\/p>\n Israel Defense Forces announced October 16 that 199 Israeli hostages, including children, are being held by Hamas and that the military is trying to discover where they are being held in Gaza. Hamas terrorists had threatened the previous week to kill one hostage every time that Israel\u2019s military bombs civilian targets in Gaza.<\/p>\n The Latin Catholic patriarch of Jerusalem has offered himself in exchange for the children being held as hostages in Gaza by Hamas.<\/p>\n Speaking to journalists via video conference on October 16, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, OFM<\/b>, 58, was asked if he would be willing to become a hostage himself in exchange for the child hostages who were taken in Hamas\u2019 attack on Israel.<\/p>\n \u201cAm I ready for an exchange? Anything, if that can lead to freedom and bring those children home, no problem. There is an absolute availability on my part,\u201d the cardinal responded.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are willing to help, even me personally,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Cardinal Pizzaballa, who shepherds the Latin Catholics living in Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, and Cyprus, told reporters that he had not had any direct communication with Hamas since their surprise attack on October 7.<\/p>\n The Jerusalem Patriarchate led by Cardinal Pizzaballa, who was himself in Rome for the Synod on Synodality at the time of the initial attack, issued its own statement on October 7 \u201cas the fighting was still raging.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe operation launched from Gaza and the reaction of the Israeli Army are bringing us back to the worst period of our recent history. The too-many casualties and tragedies, which both Palestinians and Israeli families have to deal with, will create more hatred and division, and will destroy more and more any perspective of stability,\u201d read the Patriarchate\u2019s statement.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n My conscience and moral duty require me to state clearly that what happened on October 7th in southern Israel is in no way permissible and we cannot but condemn it. […]<\/p>\n The same conscience, however, with a great burden on my heart, leads me to state with equal clarity today that this new cycle of violence has brought to Gaza over five thousand deaths, including many women and children, tens of thousands of wounded, neighborhoods razed to the ground, lack of medicine, lack of water and of basic necessities for over two million people. These are tragedies that cannot be understood and which we have a duty to denounce and condemn unreservedly. The continuous heavy bombardment that has been pounding Gaza for days will only cause more death and destruction and will only increase hatred and resentment. […]<\/p>\n It is only by ending decades of occupation and its tragic consequences, as well as giving a clear and secure national perspective to the Palestinian people that a serious peace process can begin. Unless this problem is solved at its root, there will never be the stability we all hope for. The tragedy of these days must lead us all, religious, political, civil society, international community, to a more serious commitment in this regard than what has been done so far. This is the only way to avoid other tragedies like the one we are experiencing now. We owe it to the many victims of these days and to those of years past. We do not have the right to leave this task to others.<\/p>\n Yet, I cannot live this extremely painful time without looking upward, without looking to Christ, without the faith that enlightens my view and yours on what we are experiencing, without turning our thoughts to God. We need a Word to accompany us, to comfort and encourage us. We need it like the air we breathe.<\/p>\n \u201cI have told you this so that you might have peace in me. In the world you will have tribulations, but take courage, I have conquered the world.\u201d (Jn. 16:33).<\/i><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Born and educated in Italy, Cardinal Pizzaballa has been stationed in the Holy Land since 1990, the year he was ordained a priest at age 24 in the Franciscan order. After his philosophical-theological studies in Italy, then-Father Pizzaballa obtained a licentiate in Biblical Theology at the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum of Jerusalem in 1993.<\/p>\n In 1999, he formally entered in service to the Custody of the Holy Land, a custodian priory of the Order of Friars Minor in Jerusalem, founded as the Province of the Holy Land in 1217 by Saint Francis of Assisi. In 1342, the Franciscans were declared by two papal bulls as the official custodians of the Holy Places in the name of the Catholic Church.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Holy Land changed my life. My life of faith also,\u201d the then-55-year-old bishop told EWTN News in 2020.<\/p>\n \u201cI arrived there 30 years ago. I didn\u2019t know the languages. I came from a very, very Catholic context and I was suddenly in a context where [Christians] were just 1% of the population.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite arriving without knowing the language, within five years he had overseen the publication of the Roman Missal in Hebrew. He was also the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem\u2019s vicar general for the pastoral care of Hebrew-speaking Catholics in Israel.<\/p>\n Consecrated to the episcopacy in 2016, he was named apostolic administrator of the Holy Land, and tasked by the Pope with re-organizing the financial management of a Patriarchate teetering on the brink of insolvency.<\/p>\n He was also asked to improve the pastoral situation among the various Christian communities in Israel, Jordan, Palestine and Cyprus.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the beginning it was very difficult. But once we have been transparent, I felt that all the community was very supportive and so we could overcome all our problems and turn the page finally,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Pope Francis appointed him the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem on October 24, 2020. He is the first Latin Patriarch to be made a cardinal, one of the new crop of cardinals created by Francis on September 30, 2023.<\/p>\n On October 11, Cardinal Pizzaballa called for a worldwide day of prayer and fasting for peace in the region on October 17.<\/p>\n He urged Catholics to organize times of prayer with Eucharistic adoration and recitation of the Rosary \u201cto deliver to God the Father our thirst for peace, justice, and reconciliation.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIn this time of sorrow and dismay, we do not want to remain helpless. We cannot let death and its sting (1 Cor 15:55) be the only word we hear,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n \u201cThat is why we feel the need to pray, to turn our hearts to God the Father. Only in this way we can draw the strength and serenity needed to endure these hard times, by turning to Him, in prayer and intercession, to implore and cry out to God amidst this anguish.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In a homily back in May, 2022, the Jerusalem Patriarch said, \u201cAny appropriation, any division, any gesture of exclusion and rejection of others, any form of violence is a deep wound in the life of the City and a cause of pain to all, because all are part of the one body,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is no coincidence therefore that this recent wave of violence in the entire Holy Land originated right here in Jerusalem, only a few metres away from us,\u201d alluding to Sheikh Jarrah, a largely Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem where a property dispute escalated into violence.<\/p>\n \u201cJerusalem is for all: Christians, Jews and Muslims, Israelis and Palestinians,\u201d said Patriarch Pizzaballa.<\/p>\n The violence two years ago, even in cities where different groups normally live together in harmony, was, Patriarch Pizzaballa said, a \u201cworrying sign\u201d that \u201cindicates a profound unease that everyone must pay attention to.\u201d<\/p>\n Again, in May of this year, radical Jewish activists protested violently against Christians holding a prayer service at Jerusalem\u2019s Western Wall. Patriarch Pizzaballa\u2019s close relationship with two of the city\u2019s prominent rabbis \u2014 David Lau and Yitzhak Yosef \u2014 played a major role in the release of a letter by Jerusalem\u2019s Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar condemning attacks on Christians.<\/p>\n The next month, the Patriarch met with Speaker of the Knesset Amir Ohana, who subsequently condemned the violence unequivocally.<\/p>\n (ITV staff)<\/p>\n Pope Francis<\/b> has spoken several times about the tragic conflict between Hamas and Israel, urging the fighters on both sides to cease hostilities and leaders to work for peace instead. Cardinal Pietro Parolin<\/b>, the Vatican\u2019s secretary of state, underscored on October 13 the Vatican\u2019s readiness to act in some role of mediation between Israel and Hamas.<\/p>\n At no time has Pope Francis denied that Israel has a right to defend itself against aggression, but the Israelis have been less than pleased with the Vatican\u2019s response.<\/p>\n The Pope said that \u201cit is the right of those who are attacked to defend themselves, but I am very concerned about the total siege under which the Palestinians are living in Gaza, where there have also been many innocent victims.\u201d<\/p>\n Francis said that terrorism and extremism \u201cdo not help reach a solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, but fuel hatred, violence, revenge, and only cause each other to suffer. The Middle East does not need war, but peace, a peace built on dialogue and the courage of fraternity.\u201d<\/p>\n In an interview with Vatican News on October 13, Cardinal Parolin called Hamas\u2019 attacks \u201cinhuman\u201d and said the Holy See expresses \u201ccomplete and firm condemnation.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, he also underscored the Vatican\u2019s readiness to act in some role of mediation between Israel and Hamas. \u201cI do not know how much room for dialogue there can be between Israel and the Hamas militia,\u201d Cardinal Parolin said. \u201cBut if there is \u2014 and we hope there is \u2014 it should be pursued immediately and without delay.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe Holy See is ready for any necessary mediation, as always,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n On October 22, the Vatican announced that earlier that afternoon, \u201cA phone call took place between Pope Francis and the President of the United States, Joe Biden,\u201d with the roughly 20-minute conversation \u201cfocused on situations of conflict in the world and the need to identify pathways of peace,\u201d including humanitarian aid to Gaza and prevention of escalation of the conflict there.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cIt is only by ending decades of occupation that a serious peace process can begin\u201d<\/h3>\n
On October 24, Cardinal Pizzaballa released a \u201cLetter to the Entire Diocese\u201d of Jerusalem which we excerpt here<\/strong><\/em><\/h4>\n
\nThe first Jerusalem Patriarch to be made a cardinal<\/b><\/h4>\n
\nPatriarch Pizzaballa has long been warning Jerusalem of \u201cworrying signs\u201d<\/h3>\n
\nThe Vatican\u2019s response to the Hamas attack<\/b><\/h4>\n
Israel\u2019s reaction to Vatican statements<\/b><\/h4>\n