Today’s Enlightening Entertainment will be presented in Arabic and English, with subtitles in Arabic, Aulacese (Vietnamese), Chinese, English, French, German, Hungarian, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Thai and Spanish.

Welcome, brilliant viewers, to today’s Enlightening Entertainment. Situated on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, bordering Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, Palestine is known as the cradle of civilization. Over the centuries, numerous great sages and prophets have traveled to and dwelt in this Holy Land. The ancient city of Jerusalem, for example, is one of the world's oldest spiritual centers.

Many prominent religions including Judaism, Christianity and Islam have, to various extents, taken shape in this legendary place. Some 10 kilometers south of Jerusalem lies one of the oldest cities in Palestine, Beit Jala, whose skyline is graced by the pinnacles of six churches and two mosques.

Beit Jala is well known for its religious, educational and health organizations and institutes that serve the residents of the city, many of which are run by a variety of Christian denominations. The Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Reformation, the oldest Lutheran church in the whole region, supports peace projects in the Holy Land to promote friendship and unity in Israel and Palestine.

People want only one thing, is to live in peace and security. It’s the same, doesn’t matter Jewish, Palestinian, Christian or Muslims.

Today, we will feature the unique organization serving this mission of peace, the magnificent Beit Ibrahim in Beit Jala, Palestine. Beit Ibrahim is a large church-sponsored peace project in the Middle East supported by the Abraham Beit Jala Hostel Association founded in Germany in 2001. It also known as the Abrahams Herberge, is part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Reformation compound.

My name is Axel Becker, I’m a retired Lutheran pastor. I’m living near Cologne, in a small village. Nearly every year I come to visit this place here. And I like this project, which is the project of reconciliation and meeting and to find a way to overcome all the separations.

Here in this country, you have Jewish people, you have Palestinian, Christians and Muslims, and if we have the reconciliation in the religion, that means we helped our people to be reconciliated with each other and with the other people.

Beit Ibrahim is a retreat complex that consists of a study center and a guest house. As part of the peace program, the Beit Ibrahim guest house is open to national and international visitors all year round. Youth and adults of all three Abrahamic faiths, Jewish, Muslim and Christian, gather here to build understanding and reconciliation. The proceeds of the guesthouse are used in furthering the development of various peace projects. The exquisite design of Beit Ibrahim, characterized by its vibrant oriental touches, radiates the loving, welcoming ambience of the Holy Land.

If you see this house, how it was built by the architect, which is a Palestine architect, or if you see other places, there is a beauty which I really appreciate. It’s very special. The Palestinians have a sense of beauty. They like the flowers, they like the greens, the gardens, and this makes them very friendly and it’s nice to be here.

The grounds and walls of Beit Ibrahim are built with native stone. Ancient Arabic ceilings, painted walls, round arch windows, and marble intarsia floors embrace one into the rich Palestinian culture and heritage. German artist Gamma Thesa Terheyden comments on the significance of this historical grandeur.

In the Beit Jala, lives very good stones, the stone of Jerusalem. And I heard from Abraham’s Herberge and found that it is an interesting country, interesting town to make a project with different artists. In Beit Jala, it is necessary that the other people can know many things about Palestine and Israel.

And all the time, it is so that the artist, the musicians, the writers, the philosophers, all the persons, it was in all the generations that they say what they see about the world. And it’s always the artist who show a possibility to make a little bit peace;

The arts have no boundaries. Different concepts and ideas are shared in the art exhibitions conducted regularly in the Beit Ibrahim complex.

I find artists from Germany, from Palestine, and from Israel, and that they can work together. They meet in the exhibition. And so there is a group who can work together. everybody told me that it is very good that the world knows the situation here.

The first is the picture from the artist. The next is the picture from the portrait, from himself. The third work is a work free, but you can find something what he thinks about the other land. And when I explain it for this situation, then the artist can make the same thing, and the Israel make in this picture the things about Palestine, and about Germany. And the Palestine artist can work about the Israel and so on.

The beautiful Palestinian artworks embellish the walls of the Beit Ibrahim to create a warm and harmonious atmosphere. People of all religions and backgrounds gather in the complex weekly to listen to the sermon. Music, joy, and praise of Allah fill the people and the church. In Palestine, both Christians and Muslims call God, “Allah.” When we return, we’ll visit the church’s youth housing and talk to some of the boys who grew up here in the church compound. Please stay tuned to Supreme Master Television.

We want to give hope, we want to show the other people there is another way of life. We don’t like to be separated; we want to feel free like another people.

Welcome back to Enlightening Entertainment featuring the magnificent Beit Ibrahim in the compound of Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Reformation in Beit Jala, Palestine. Located at the center of various routes linking the three continents, Palestinian customs have gone through centuries of exchange with her neighboring Arab countries as well as international travelers.

We are belonging to this land, which we call Palestine. And we are part of the Middle East. We don’t feel that the people of Egypt or Syrian or Lebanon or Jordan are different from us. But our roots come from this land.

The Beit Ibrahim provides a platform for the Palestinian Christians, Jews, and Muslims to meet and experience life together. It is with the dream that someday, people from different religions and backgrounds can live in harmony, respect and unity as one nation. One such initiative is the establishment of a boys’ boarding and welfare center.

Our boys’ home, it’s like an orphanage. This house has the name of Abraham. Abraham Herberge in Germany, Ibrahim in Arabic, or House of Abraham. And that means it’s a vision. We want to make possible for the children of Abraham, Christian, Jewish and Muslim, to meet in this Abraham’s House.

Here, the children and youth grew up together, despite their ethnicity, religious beliefs, and family status.

Some children, they don’t have a father or both, or divorced, and if they stay at street, then they have to think to have radical things. Here in the Boys’ Home they take care of us. That’s means it gives us home. That’s mean that we not thinking about the radical things, but we think about how to live together with peace.

I am here since 20 years, I grew up at the Boys’ Home here, near the church. I think it’s here. It’s an example for to build the bridges between the Christians and the Muslims. I am feel as like my home here.

I don’t feel that I am Muslim and they are Christians, I feel that we are brothers, and in the boy’s home that we can trust, it’s no problem for us, and we can pray. They give us freedom to live together, without any problem, without any troubles, and really it’s very good.

Every Wednesday, the church is open for all to pray for peace. Pilgrims from all walks of life are welcome to join.

We have a common service in the church. Christian, Jewish and Muslims are praying together.

We have the church and we have also the mosque. I visit the mosque and I also visit the church.

The church or the mosque, we pray for one God.

Music is of particular importance in the parish meeting program. Through collective efforts in music making, students establish friendship and learn to trust one another.

Also we have music projects. That’s also for the Muslims and Christians. But I mean it also brings people together, as the Muslims. As also Abraham Tent in the refugee camp. This is about the Lutheran church here and a lot of children live together in the tent. I mean that is a lot of education and activity, that’s how to be together every time.

Only a few kilometers from the city of Beit Jala is the refugee camp Dheisha. Over 12,000 people dwell in challenging conditions, including children. Abraham’s tent project provides a meeting place for providing children nutritional and educational assistance.

There is a lot of children of the refugee camp. We are offering them food, warm meals without expecting anything from them. And they have the opportunity after they’re eating to be helped in the education, in their home school work. Another project is our arts project. We are doing something out of recycled glass. We are giving some people the opportunity to learn this profession, do something for the environment.

We have to think for our children, for the future of our children. We have to take care for the environment. The whole world has to be united.

Blessed viewers, thank you for your company today on Enlightening Entertainment. Please join us again next Friday for the final part of our program featuring the marvelous Beit Ibrahim in Beit Jala, Palestine. Coming up next is Words of Wisdom, after Noteworthy News. May Heaven bestow peace and protection to all.

Today’s Enlightening Entertainment will be presented in Arabic and English, with subtitles in Arabic, Aulacese (Vietnamese), Chinese, English, French, German, Hungarian, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Thai and Spanish.

Welcome, splendid viewers, to today’s Enlightening Entertainment.

Reverend Jadallah M. Shihadeh is the Pastor of the Lutheran Reformation Church in Beit Jala, a small Palestinian town situated approximately 12 km south of Jerusalem. He has a dream for all the people of Palestine.

Our message of peace, it’s a message of life. We want to live in freedom and in dignity. I am a Christian but I want to live in peace with Jews and with Muslims. There is no difference between the people. We want to live in dignity and democracy. And my hope for all the nations in the whole world [is] to understand that we need each other. That means I hope someday we know that we are a human being.

Reverend Axel Becker is a retired Lutheran pastor from Germany who frequently sojourns in Palestine. He shares Reverend Shihadeh’s dream of peace in Palestine. At times, Palestine reminds him of the process to harmony in his own country, symbolized by the removal of the Berlin wall.

It was a totally non-violent process. This is what we hope here and I think all the people which is engaged in the Peace Week, they hope that it will be a non-violent process, but an effective process, that these things have to end.

Peace Week is a non-violent, non-political movement with the sole purpose of bringing together the children of Abraham. It was begun by the two reverends and their organization, Beit Ibrahim, also known as the Abraham’s Herberge. As part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Reformation compound, Beit Ibrahim is a large church-sponsored peace project in the Middle East.

Both people can live together in respect, because this is the idea of Abraham’s Herberge, (That’s right.) that only if both people are living together in respect, then they can live in security and in a healthy way.

Father Axel Becker speaks about some of Beit Ibrahim’s activities.

We meet every week on Monday and pray together to have a message of a non-violent future. Or another example, during our Peace Week, we are organizing a football match. Muslims and Christians are playing together. We decided to finance the summer camps in Bethlehem area for the children of the refugee camps. Some churches, from outside, “Why are you doing this? Why you don’t do this for your children, the Christian children?”

And I told him, You have the Christian children all the time by you, you could help whenever you want. But these children from the refugee camp are children that are in need, and we have to help them to get a better life.

Reverend Shihadeh’s assistant is a Muslim young man named Muhammad. Muhammad grew up at Beit Ibrahim’s Boys’ Home for youngsters in need. Reverend Shihadeh is indeed Muhammad’s close mentor and friend. Together, they are a living example of a peaceful relationship among Palestinians of different backgrounds.

We don’t say this: “You are Christian and you are Muslim.” No. We say, “We are brothers.” I mean this is the example really here, to learn like a Palestinians, not we are Christians or Muslims – just we are Palestinian.

He is a young man whom I trust, and I want to give him the opportunity. Through him, we have the contact to the Muslims, and the Muslims lost their fear to enter the church, because they know that is my secretary is a Muslim. I mean, you have to do something, against your fears. You have to invite the people, don’t say he is a Jew, or he is a Muslim, or that he is a Christian, try to find ways how to live together. And Muhammad opened us doors to the world of the Muslims. It’s an example.

And we called him jokingly the Lutheran Muslim.

And I’m working here, so I like this, please.

And the Muslims in our church, they have their Ramadan fasting, and they invite me sometimes, (That’s right.) but under one condition. He said always, “You have to fast… ( Yes.) The whole day. It’s one condition, we invite you to be now a Muslim Lutheran. He is a Lutheran Muslim. Now I am a Lutheran Muslim, but he asked me, “Please come and be with us, but under one condition, fast, you have to fast all the day.” And (That’s right.) it’s good for me.

When we return, we’ll learn more about Beit Ibrahim’s recent peace activities and how the strengths of the Palestinians are a foundation for peace. Please stay tuned to Supreme Master Television.

Welcome back to Enlightening Entertainment and our program featuring Beit Ibrahim, an interfaith peace project in Palestine. Beit Jala has almost 17,500 inhabitants. 80% are Christians: Orthodox, Catholic or Protestant. The remaining population is Muslim. All have been living in mutually tolerant co-existence for many years.

Thy kingdom come They will be done

Reverend Jadallah M. Shihadeh, Pastor of the Lutheran Reformation Church in Beit Jala, Palestine, has firm faith in the Palestinian people. It is because harmony is already in their history, and in their nature.

We are a nation among the Arabs who are thinking democracy, in a democratic way. And the Palestinian people does not like to educate others peoples. They have respect. When people are with us, they are part of us and part of our life.

Father Axel Becker also discusses his own observations of the Palestinian people.

The family is very important. The families and to be together and to help each other. This is a very big factor and so I think the families are more important than the democratic institutions sometimes. So this is very special. For instance, the boys’ home here is important for children which have difficult situations. But if they are relatives then the family helps. Generally, I feel it’s a very... very kind people. They like to laugh and they’re very open.

This is my experience.

That’s very positive in the culture of Palestine. Nobody has to feel he is alone. Also, if you have a neighbor, he is a poor man and he is alone, all the neighbors visiting, try to visit him day for day, they bring him food, they bring him something to drink. They are taking care for him. There’s no need to ask them.

Maybe I can add one thing which I noticed here.

One thing I noticed here, what I think maybe it is special here for the Palestinians, it’s their interest for education. If you see all these young people here in the schools, so many schools, and institutions for education and the universities. This people is a very educated people and I think many doctors and many really very intelligent people are coming from these Palestinians.

In 2009, the Children of Abraham from the youth housing of Beit Ibrahim, together with other members of the church, initiated a Peace Week movement to strengthen the solidarity of peace workers in Palestine.

There were around 2,500 of us. We started to walk from here, then to the wall, where we stood by the wall with candles and prayer. We only had candles and prayer. There with many people, Christians and Jews and Muslims, we prayed and asked God that this wall will disappear from our country, not only from our country, but from our minds and from our hearts.

We are interested, to find ways how to overcome difficulties, obstacles, hatred, fears, and to be like Muhammad said, bridges of peace. And therefore we are open. You can be an unreligious person, but you are invited to be part of this movement. Because we want to be like a river, and we are moving, and we are welcoming everybody to be part of this movement, but under one condition: we are non-violence movement.

The peaceful demonstration expressed the heartfelt plea for peace and tolerance. Ritual and symbols can also be useful aids to create, even innovate, a harmonious atmosphere.

The Muslim, he has to give the bread to others. The Christian has to give a candle, Jewish person has to give a flower.

Each faith would share a symbol of life, hope, or friendship. Until the message of peace for all is realized, for Reverends Shihadeh and Becker, the dialogues will continue.

My wish is that these people can live in freedom and in justice. Together aside of people of Israel, the Jews, which also needs justice and their freedom, and this way, this should happen, this is my hope.

All the inhabitants of the world shall recognize and know the truth: that we have not been placed on this Earth to wage war and not for hatred or bloodshed. We only came to know Thee.

We need each other and we can survive only together. And if we decide to live in peace, it’s enough if we take care for the Earth, for our beautiful Earth. If we could do that, that means we have the possibility to live together.

May Heaven bless you, Reverend Shihadeh, Reverend Becker, and Beit Ibrahim for all you are doing to bring peace to the Holy Land and our world. We share your dream of a kinder, more open-hearted future among people of all faiths and cultures, as befits the children of God.

Joyful viewers, thank you for joining us today on Enlightening Entertainment. Coming up next is Words of Wisdom right after Noteworthy News. May your life be filled with Heaven’s grace and love.