Roudy
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- Mar 16, 2012
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Even the Pope is afraid say anything. Last time he said something Muslims nearly burned down half of Europe.
Christians in Gaza Make Their Appeal to the Pope
By Tim McGirk / Gaza
To be a Christian in Gaza these days requires discretion. When I approached a group of Christians lunching in a beachside hotel — they were identifiable because the women did not wear Islamic headscarves — they insisted that Hamas is tolerant of their faith. But one man grabbed my sleeve and pulled me aside. "We can't talk openly. Hamas leave us alone. But there are many [Gazans] who are more fanatical, and they hate us," he said.
The young Christian says that in 2007 the manager of a Christian bookstore in Gaza was shot dead. Early last year, he adds, armed gunmen stormed the local YMCA and tossed a bomb into the library, destroying thousands of books. Hamas condemned both attacks but never made any arrests. The head of a Christian relief organization was also asked by Hamas to leave Gaza after accusations that his staff were trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. One Catholic nun from Slovenia brushed aside these worries. "We practice our faith, but we do it quietly," she says. "And people here respect us."
The Cinema Club, for example, is run as part of a film class at a local Catholic school, but most of its students are Muslims. Inside, the altar of the Virgin Mary is easy to disassemble so that the room can revert to being a Cinema Club when the Muslim students return to class. On the wall hangs a trinity of portraits that display the seemingly contradictory loyalties of Palestinian Christians: the Latin Patriarch, the Pope and late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. (See pictures of heartbreak in the Middle East.)
In Gaza, those Christians who can wrangle a way of leaving, do. The ancient seafront city once had a thriving Christian community, but now it is down to 2,500 souls. They emigrate to Australia, the United States, Lebanon, anywhere they have relatives who can help them get started on a new life. Many attending the Friday service are widows dressed in black and men with hearty singing voices but shoulders stooped with age.
Read more: Christians in Gaza Make Their Appeal to the Pope - TIME
Christians in Gaza Make Their Appeal to the Pope
By Tim McGirk / Gaza
To be a Christian in Gaza these days requires discretion. When I approached a group of Christians lunching in a beachside hotel — they were identifiable because the women did not wear Islamic headscarves — they insisted that Hamas is tolerant of their faith. But one man grabbed my sleeve and pulled me aside. "We can't talk openly. Hamas leave us alone. But there are many [Gazans] who are more fanatical, and they hate us," he said.
The young Christian says that in 2007 the manager of a Christian bookstore in Gaza was shot dead. Early last year, he adds, armed gunmen stormed the local YMCA and tossed a bomb into the library, destroying thousands of books. Hamas condemned both attacks but never made any arrests. The head of a Christian relief organization was also asked by Hamas to leave Gaza after accusations that his staff were trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. One Catholic nun from Slovenia brushed aside these worries. "We practice our faith, but we do it quietly," she says. "And people here respect us."
The Cinema Club, for example, is run as part of a film class at a local Catholic school, but most of its students are Muslims. Inside, the altar of the Virgin Mary is easy to disassemble so that the room can revert to being a Cinema Club when the Muslim students return to class. On the wall hangs a trinity of portraits that display the seemingly contradictory loyalties of Palestinian Christians: the Latin Patriarch, the Pope and late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. (See pictures of heartbreak in the Middle East.)
In Gaza, those Christians who can wrangle a way of leaving, do. The ancient seafront city once had a thriving Christian community, but now it is down to 2,500 souls. They emigrate to Australia, the United States, Lebanon, anywhere they have relatives who can help them get started on a new life. Many attending the Friday service are widows dressed in black and men with hearty singing voices but shoulders stooped with age.
Read more: Christians in Gaza Make Their Appeal to the Pope - TIME
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