Rev David Coffey, Moderator of the Free Churches and President of the Baptist World Alliance, has spoken with Christian Today ahead of his pilgrimage to the Holy Land with the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Archbishop of Westminster, and the head of the Armenian Church of Great Britain on Wednesday.
As the number of pilgrims to Bethlehem continues to drop and Christians continue to leave the Holy Land in large numbers, Rev Coffey called for more Christians to follow the example of the leaders and show solidarity with their brothers and sisters in Christ by visiting Bethlehem.During their visit, the ecumenical group plans to meet and hear the experiences of the Evangelical Local Council of Churches of the Holy Land (ELCCHL). They also hope to meet with the author of Bethlehem Besieged, Lutheran Pastor Mitri Raheb, who paints in his book an intimate portrait of Palestinian life under occupation.
The ecumenical group will be in the Holy Land until their return to the UK on Christmas Eve.
CT: You are embarking on this pilgrimage with the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Archbishop of Westminster, and the head of the Armenian Church of Great Britain. You must all be feeling a great sense of urgency to be in Bethlehem at this time? Why did you feel it was necessary to go and to be there?
DC: There are two reasons. One is that we meet regularly as the four co-presidents of Churches Together in England for prayer, reflection and talking together and rather than just always meet around a table we decided two years ago it would be good to walk together somewhere. So we went and visited a parish in the Greenwich area of East London and that was really good because we are essentially Christian pastors and our heart is for God's mission wherever that takes place.
Then, earlier this year when we were talking together in mid-summer we did express concern about the Christians of the Holy Land and somewhere in the conversation it was suggested that we had walked around a parish in East London so why not walk around the Holy Land. I think on that basis, we decided a good time to go would be around Christmas time.
Second to that, we had a standing invitation from the Christians of the Holy Land to come and see them so those two ideas came together. All four of us have been to the Holy Land before but I have never been to the Holy Land at this time of year. At any time it is a privilege to go and visit the sites of our Lord Jesus but to go at this time is a particularly wonderful privilege.
How do you feel about the Israeli security wall that surrounds Bethlehem and the checkpoints which the people of the town have to pass in and out of?
