We know it: the war in Ukraine has taken attention and resources away from the entire Middle East, especially in Lebanon where the situation is disastrous. Grain is scarce, electricity only works for a few hours a day. They say you cannot even escape: there is a lack of paper and ink for passports. In […]

I am Chiara and I have just finished my year of Universal Civil Service in Bethlehem with the Association Pro Terra Sancta for the project “White Helmets for the Inclusion of Fragile People in Palestine.” When one thinks of Bethlehem, perhaps he or she connects it directly to the birth of Jesus and Christmas. What […]

“Roman coins! Only 50 shekels!” This is how Mahmoud (fancy name) answers when we ask him what are the bronze pieces, vaguely squared, that he hands us. We are in Sebastia, in the North of Palestine, in the middle of the central square of the country. In fact, on the irregularly minted and half-worn face, […]

Of episodes of multiplication of the loaves, the four Gospels abound. There are six in all, with the Gospels of Mark and Matthew even telling two consecutive ones. Yet, in the midst of this abundance, what is missing, as is often the case, are the geographical details that can help identify the place where these […]

In Capernaum, on the shores of Lake Tiberias, some new information panels will guide from now on the visits of tourists and pilgrims to one of the most important archaeological sites of the Holy Land. Finally, it comes to say. This is confirmed by Father Luca Panza, a Franciscan, who has been in Capernaum for […]

Francesco Spagnolli is an assistant country coordinator at the headquarters of Pro Terra Sancta in Damascus . He tells us about his experience in Syria. He arrived in the Syrian capital on May 19 to follow the projects of the Association. We interviewed him to tell us about the reality in which he immersed himself […]

Peter and Paul, two pillars of Christian tradition and faith, are today venerated together by the Catholic Church. It is a choice full of meaning: the two men knew each other and tried together to start the then nascent Church on its first, uncertain steps. And, as is often the case in so many deep […]

The Guesthouse: literally ‘the guest house’. It is a model of hospitality and tourism that is developing a lot, in recent times, all over the world. It is a ‘light’ offer, night and breakfast, with the possibility of living the spaces of the Guesthouse in a flexible way, as if they were really those of […]

“What will this child ever be?” (Lk 1:66); this is how, according to the Gospel of Luke, the men and women who witnessed this event react to the birth of John the Baptist. And in fact it was a truly prodigious juncture: John’s mother and Zechariah’s wife, Elizabeth, was elderly and barren; Zechariah himself had […]

Lebanon went to the polls in the midst of the worst economic, social and health crisis since the birth of the Lebanese Republic. The parliamentary elections on Sunday 15 May, in fact, were held in a climate of protests and general discontent. It would be simplistic to say that the Lebanese people feel anger at […]

“Never let a good crisis go to waste”. This famous “teaching” promoted by the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill at the end of the Second World War has found in the current President of Turkey, Recep Tayyep Erdoğan, a faithful disciple. Turkey as an international mediator In the name of the good relations that […]

Eleven years after the break of the bloody civil war, 6 Syrians out of 10 suffer from hunger and have no idea where and how to get food. According to the Global Report on Food Crisis, there are more than 12 million people who are living a situation of food insecurity in Syria. FAO defines […]

The first Arab-Israeli war of 1948 ended in a landslide victory for the Israeli army. The Nakba, so called by the Arab countries, marked a crucial turning point in the history of Palestine and the entire Middle East region. At the end of the war of ’48, the United Nations issued Resolution 194 which enshrined […]

The ancient history of Palestine «Lord, disarm tongues and hands, renew hearts and minds, so that the word that brings us together may always be ‘brother’, and the style of our life become: shalom, peace, salam! Amen». Pope Francis, prayer for peace, 8 June 2014. Retenu, Haru, Canaan, Iuadea, Terrasanta, Falastīn … as many names […]

A small dark stone church stands on the shores of the Lake Tiberias in the northern region of Galilee. Three small windows in neo-Gothic style appear on its gabled façade, completed by a sober, slightly splayed portal. This is the chapel of the Primacy of Peter, where, according to the twenty-first chapter of the Gospel […]

The liturgical calendar commemorates today the Visitation of Mary, that is, the Virgin’s journey to the home of her relative Elizabeth. The episode, narrated in the first chapter of Luke’s Gospel, is famous. Mary, then pregnant with Jesus, goes to the home of the elder Elizabeth, also pregnant (John the Baptist would be her son) […]

The Ascension of Jesus is the episode that concludes the narrative of the Gospels and opens that of the Acts of the Apostles. Today, May 26th, the Church commemorates this event, the passage of the risen Jesus from Earth to Heaven. The most vivid narration of the events is contained in the Acts of the […]

The moment has come: on next June 9th, the Dar al-Majus Community Home will finally be inaugurated in Bethlehem. Offices, training places, exhibition spaces and art galleries, all this will find home in Dar al-Majus, which literally means “the house of the Magi”. This is an old Ottoman building that rises in the heart of […]

Leaving your country, home, family, and friends is one of the hardest decisions one can make. The majority of people have experienced leaving their childhood home perhaps merely traveling to the next village or city. However,some people are forced to leave their country, sometimes temporarily, but sometimes permanently. The history of Lebanese emigration started with […]

May has already begun, and this month invites us to gather around Our Lady. There are many ways to do so, and one of them is to go directly to the place where Mary lived her daily life: Nazareth. Here the Virgin conceived Jesus, beginning the story of redemption; here the Holy Family lived together […]