Concert at Jerusalem kehilla

Many friends and guests filled the chapel in the Saints Simeon and Anne House in Jerusalem on Wednesday evening. Among the guests of honor were Greek Catholic Archbishop of Jerusalem, Yusuf Jules Zerey, Latin Bishop William Shomali, Mgr. Matteo De Mori, Counselor at the Vatican Embassy, Sister Frida Nasser SJA, General President of the Union of Women Religious in the Holy Land and Reverend Paraic Reamonn, Minister of the Church of Scotland. Many other male and female religious, students and pilgrims came to get to know better the music of the kehilla.

The musicians that formed the musical ensemble for the evening included: Father Rafic, responsible for the Jerusalem kehilla who also introduced the program, Benedetto, seminarian of the kehilla, Tiago, Brother of Sion, Martine, Eliane and Samia. The program they prepared included songs from the various liturgical seasons: Advent, Christmas, Ordinary Time, Lent, Easter and Pentecost. They began with Psalm 1, sung in memory of long time member of the kehilla, Little Brother Yaacov, who died the day of the concert at the age of 95. They ended with Psalm 150, sung in joy and thanksgiving for the gift that Saint John Paul II had been for the Church.

At the end of the concert, Bishop Shomali thanked the kehilla for its music and again warmly proposed that the Hebrew language and Arabic language musicians, representing the two lungs of the Local Church, get together in order to prepare jointly a repertoire of songs that use the two languages in harmony as a sign of the unity of the Church in the Holy Land.

At the end of the evening, Father David, responsible for the kehillot in Israel, presented the guests of honor with a CD of music from the kehilla. This CD was also presented to two Jewish activists in the field of Jewish-Christian relations, also present in the audience: Ms. Yisca Harani and Ms. Hana Bendcowsky. Before leaving the chapel, those present sang the Our Father in Arabic and Hebrew.