Chasing the Divine in the Holy Land (3 page)

I drag my feet across each broad step, heart pounding, and sneak glances at the faces around me. Is he a fellow pilgrim? Am I traveling to Israel with her? I must find Brian. If the picture
on his Web site is accurate, he's under thirty and handsome in a soulful way. I know he has a fire in his belly. Of course, I've never actually met him. It's possible he posted someone else's photo. This entire documentary could be an elaborate scam. He could be a sociopath, lurking . . .

There he is, standing near the columns in front of the church. He's tall and gangly and good-looking. He spots me — I also sent him my picture — and we hurry toward each other, making gestures of recognition, then embrace. My face touches his shirt, and I know that this is real. I'm going to Israel with this stranger. I back away from his shoulder to ask a question but he holds up a finger that signals Stop.

“Can we redo that?” His voice is so pleasant that it takes me a moment to understand. He tilts his head, and I notice two cameramen on the steps below us. “They were both loading film and missed it,” Brian says.

The men shoulder large video cameras and point them at us. Reflexively, I look away.

“Just go back there,” Brian says, retracing my route with a finger in the air, “then hug me right here — spontaneously, like you just did.”

In the plaza people are sweating and smoking and talking into the air like crazy people. But none of them are going to Israel with strangers.

“Ruth?” Brian says.

“You want me to go down the steps. Turn around. Come back up. Hug you. Spontaneously.”

He smiles. “Right.”

I should have expected this. A documentary. It'll be like a wedding, where nothing counts unless it's captured on film. The cameramen wait, their faces hidden by equipment. Well, then. I'm cooperative — at least I want them to think I'm cooperative. This time I don't eye the faces around me as I cross the plaza. Instead, I feel their eyes on me. I'm not sure whether I should saunter or hurry eagerly. When I reach Brian, I don't know what, exactly, to do. I slide my arms awkwardly around his waist and squeeze briefly.

“That was great.” Brian looks across the plaza, where he must have spotted another pilgrim. He says, “I've got to go, but don't follow.” A young, dark-haired woman is coming to meet him.

I park myself on the top step of the plaza and get out my journal, hoping that writing will calm me. The two daughters I'm leaving behind are on my mind. The older one is just beginning her first year of college; the other is a sophomore in high school. I write another prayer:

Dear Lord, watch over my family. Assuage their loneliness. Don't let them feel abandoned. Let this be a positive thing, a time to draw together as father and daughters, an example that personal goals are a worthy pursuit. May this filmmaking venture be a positive thing, to your glory. May my role in it be beneficial. May it positively affect someone spiritually someday. I'll never know who or when or how, but I will trust the power of the Spirit to use our best efforts. Please make me open and articulate — and a conduit of your grace. May my failings themselves be the key to opening someone's heart to you. Please protect me from harm for the sake of my daughters. Please keep them from harm while I'm apart from them. Please, please make this a positive thing. Confirm for me that this was the right decision. I feel the need for that confidence. Amen.

My eyes rise from my journal — and I'm looking into a video camera. So, according to this new camera-based theology, does this mean that my prayer counts? A few feet away I notice the second camera. Both cameras pivot to focus on a thirty-something man perched farther down the steps. His hair is strawberry blond, and even from a distance I can tell he's perfectly groomed. Two large, wheeled suitcases stand beside him. He glances at the cameras, then at me, and then we both avert our eyes.

Where to escape? The church appears to be open. I notice a sign for a vesper service about to begin and hurry into the sanctuary, where five people are seated. I pick up a bulletin and slide into a pew. Someone produces bulletins for a service with five
people attending? They must have astounding secretarial support. The priest begins. He zips along like he's got a taxi waiting. The bulletin helps me find the place in the worship book. Even so, I must gallop to catch up. There's a sung refrain printed in the liturgy, which the priest muscles through without accompaniment. I admire his guts. After the benediction he doesn't even come down from the chancel — just disappears out a side door. Class dismissed. What would that be like, to not shake hands with your people? Seminary taught me that those ten minutes were the most important minutes of my week.

I return to the plaza just in time to see a taxi pull up to the curb. This time Brian runs out to greet the arrival, a middle-aged man, and they cling to each other and laugh. The other pilgrims and I watch the ritual filming of the rolling luggage. This has ­become something like a wedding rehearsal that's gone on too long.

With the newest arrival in tow, Brian comes up the steps, gathering the rest of us like so many ducklings. There are six of us, and four are women.

“Don't talk yet,” Brian warns. “Just follow me.” He leads us through a heavy metal door and up several cement stairs. The room we enter is like every other Sunday school room I've ever seen, with laminate-top tables and orange molded chairs. What's different is the Last Supper-style arrangement: two tables pushed together, end to end, with chairs along the far side and at each end.

“OK,” Brian announces. “We're waiting for one more, but he's been delayed, so we'll get started. We'll stop and eat when he arrives.”

I choose the seat at the end farthest from Brian, and as the cameramen hang a boom microphone over the other end, I feel a gush of relief.

“Tell us your name,” Brian says, “and a little about your church.”

The youngest woman seems unfazed by the cameras, which astounds me. Her name is Jessica, and she's on the staff of a nondenominational church in Washington, D.C. She speaks with such passion that her slightly frizzy hair seems almost electric. I
wonder how many years it's been since I conveyed that kind of energy about ministry. I smooth my hair.

Next is another young woman, and she turns out to be a Presbyterian clergywoman like me. Her name is Ashley, and she speaks with the vivacity of a candidate for student body president. She's married, with one small child. Even before she pulls out the photo, she has my vote for pilgrimage sweetheart.

Someone comes in with pizza boxes, and behind him is the elusive last pilgrim, an African-American man. We pause filming while we help ourselves to slices of New York pizza on cheap paper plates. It's not the meal I'd envisioned, yet it does relax the atmosphere. When we resume introductions, we begin with the middle-aged man whom Brian greeted so warmly.

“My name is Michael Ide,” he says.

It's an unusual last name, the same as Brian's, and I think,
Wow, what are the chances?

He continues, “I'm a Lutheran pastor from Kansas, married, and have three grown sons — ”

Brian interrupts: “Which one is your favorite?”

Everyone laughs, and I laugh especially hard, the way you do when you're the last one to get the joke.

We move through the next two introductions. JoAnne is an Episcopalian priest from California who appears to be about my age and is quite down-to-earth. She's followed by the late-arriving black man, who says, “My name is Shane, but I go by ActsNine on stage.” I wonder what that means, but he's in a hurry to make something else clear. “I've never been to seminary,” he says, cutting his eyes at each of us. “I was converted in prison, and now I do prison ministry.” The cameras pan for our reaction. We all wait attentively. I watch Shane's handsome, guarded face and wonder if we'll become close.

The strawberry-blond man introduces himself with a Southern drawl as Charlie. He's attending a Baptist seminary and talks enthusiastically about the large church in South Carolina where he's an intern. The camera then turns to me. Going last hasn't settled my nerves after all. I tell them my name and where I'm
from. I explain about my church, that it's tiny and that I'm the solo pastor, half-time. I say the church is healthy — and wonder what that will mean to them.

Last, Brian introduces the two cameramen. They attend the same Episcopal church in Los Angeles that Brian does. I have to focus hard to remember even their names: Michael and John. That makes two Michaels in our group of ten, so one, in my mind, becomes “Camera Michael.”

The next morning's itinerary says we'll fly to Tel Aviv by way of London, after some sort of blessing service. Standing in Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Brian explains that he'd like each of us to lead a brief worship service sometime during the trip, as a way of sharing our faith traditions. He wants us to discuss our differences so we can overcome them. He's all about the ecumenical angle.

“My dad will lead this first service,” Brian informs us. “There's an order for prayer, and he's going to pick a Psalm.”

Charlie the Baptist asks, “Are we gonna really pray, or use this cheat-book?” He pulls a Book of Divine Worship from a pew rack and brandishes it.

Michael cracks up. He and Charlie were roommates last night and apparently hit it off.

The cameramen need to set up, so I wander away. I'd like to pretend the cameras don't exist. The church is all dark, polished wood and smells like citrus. I climb the stairs to the balcony and see that there's a beautiful organ console with extensive pipes. I immediately think about the organ in my own church, and the repairs it needs, repairs we can't afford. But these are not pilgrim thoughts.

The cameras are ready. “Stand in a semicircle behind the altar,” Brian instructs. “Can you look comfortable?”

I want to tell him that I'm doing my best. But there's a camera right there, and, besides that, Presbyterians don't do altars. Have you heard of the Reformation?

Black cord necklaces are laid on the altar, each with a medallion — apparently the image of some saint. After we read Psalm 121 aloud responsively, we're supposed to put the necklaces on each other, though nobody says what they signify.

I wait as Jessica fumbles with the clasp around my neck. The medallion rides on the pulse of my throat, like a talisman. It's my turn to put the necklace on Ashley, and she whispers, “Is this a lucky charm?”

I feel a rush of affection for my Presbyterian sister as I whisper back, “I'm not sure what it is.”

JoAnne overhears us. “It's a Saint Christopher. Patron saint of travelers.”

After the service we squeeze into a van to ride to Kennedy Airport. Our plane is a huge jet, and we walk further and further back. Our seats are in the second row from the rear wall. We smell diesel and grimace at each other. Maybe that's why the woman in front of me has apparently doused herself with perfume. But we are served free drinks, which I didn't know was standard on transatlantic flights. Outside I quietly order a gin and tonic; inside I praise the Lord.

We are flying east, toward the morning light. Time speeds up as the clock turns back. I imagine I can feel time crumble under us hour by hour as the clock reverses, as if we are barefoot on a beach watching the sand under our toes dissolve with each succeeding wave. But the sand isn't gone, and neither is our day. It's displaced. We will regain it at the end of this pilgrimage. I can't help but wonder:
What will change between this day, which we are losing, and that day, which we will gain?

We land at Heathrow Airport in London amid chaos. We disembark and wait in a line so endless we can't be sure where it goes. We are pilgrims becoming disoriented to our old world in order to cross a threshold into a new world. In this moment we are in some kind of liminal space between the two. Whatever stratum we might be entering I cannot say. But I can feel my old life slipping away.

Eventually we board a second aircraft as huge as the first.
This time we are seated in the fourth row from the back. Repeat the last six hours. Taxi. Take-off. Diesel fumes. Drinks. Dinner. Time like sand.

Mount Scopus, Jerusalem

CHAPTER 3

Olive Trees and Sparrows

Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.

M
ATTHEW 6:26

T
HE FIRST SHOCK
when you walk into the Tel Aviv airport is its size and shine. “Arrival” and “Departure” signs flip over into multiple languages in a futuristic way. It looks and operates more like a movie set than any transportation terminal I've experienced. The second shock is the guns. Guards wearing berets carry long firearms or wear them strapped against their bodies. After twenty-five hours of travel, we're all a little giddy, but the weaponry has a chilling effect.