I found this one of the most powerful articles I had read on our Christian responsibility and response to the Middle East situation. Mary Page

There is one word, one reality we do not face when we as a Christian church address the issue of the Israeli/Palestinian atrocities and death: Cowardice. Christian Cowardice, Episcopalian Cowardice, Congregational Cowardice, Personal Cowardice. We bemoan the "situation over there" and we can occasionally pull ourselves together to "Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem," or issue sympathetic statements; but beyond that we have elected to demur, to rationalize, to let personal comfort reign, to say we are afraid and let that explanation for our non involvement be enough. In doing no more than this, we show the absolute sham and hypocrisy of our faithfulness.

We have a tiny, embattled, desperate Christian community in the Holy Land; indigenous worshipping Palestinian Christians who call that beleaguered land home. These are the first Christians whose history in this land goes back to Christ. They are our brothers and sisters to whom we are committed through union with Christ. But to whom we can only say "sorry" as they face eradication as a worshipping presence in the birthplace of the faith that unites us all and makes us one. We do not visit, we do not send material or financial support, we do not use our power and influence to have the Israeli oppressive force stop, we do not use our lives as shield to the weak, as succor to the poor and famished, as help and salvation to the desperate. We are cowards. This is the great sin for which we are responsible when facing our responsibility to our family in the Holy Land.

Our cowardice. The great "things left undone" when it comes to supporting an indigenous worshipping presence "over there" - have a taproot sin, and that is our cowardice, our unwillingness to get involved in an active, powerful way, our unwillingness to be radically Christian, to face danger, risk, death because we absolutely insist that the body of Christ stay alive and flourish in the land of its origin.

Oh, but it's dangerous! Oh, I'm afraid! Oh, I have a family and it would be irresponsible if I went over there and anything happened to me! WHAT KIND OF FAITHFULNESS IS THAT? What kind of life do we believe Christ called us to? Comfy? Risk free? Unchallenging? Unfearful? Uncommitted except when it is convenient and fits into our schedule? Where are the scriptures that support that? Whose are the holy lives we admire that support that? They aren't there; they just aren't there. We are cowards, pure and simple; responsive to fear and convenience first, and scripture and witness somewhere further down our priority list. What should we be doing? The list is endless, but the major categories might be: VISIT - so what if it's dangerous. "Even though you die, not a hair on your head shall be harmed." Individuals should visit, groups should visit, the House of Bishops should visit. People need to see that we care, they need to feel it and touch it, they need the power and courage and peace of it.

USE THE INFLUENCE OF BEING A UNITED STATES CITIZEN - Do you know why Pilate is mentioned in the Creed? After all, he seems just kind of a chump from one perspective. He is mentioned because he had all the power to make things different, to make them come out differently, and he elected to demur. The United States, and its Christian population, is Pilate in the current situation: We have all the power to make things in the Holy Land come out differently, to make things come out justly for both the Palestinians and Israelis, and we aren't using it. We don't influence our congress people, we don't influence our churches, we take absolutely no leadership, we give up at the slightest negative reaction from those whose views are different from ours. We are cowards; and we will be accounted for that.

PROVIDE FINANCIAL AND MATERIAL SUPPORT TO YOUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN PALESTINE - Of course that means sending money and supplies, but it means more than that; it means confronting head on the people who don't want you to do that and who will try to block your efforts. It means getting into arguments, getting your hands dirty, acting risky, using your power. RAISE UP YOUR VOICE AND MOVE YOUR BODY WHERE IT WILL BE MOST EFFECTIVE IN SAYING 'NO!' TO THE TERRIBLE INJUSTICES BEING PERPETRATED AGAINST YOUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS - Move! Don't just write out, Yell Out Peace and an end to Injustice. Get your body into somebody's office, somebody's face, somebody's presence - either individually or on groups - and insist that your brothers and sisters need all that it takes not just to survive but to thrive and grow in their homeland. Insist upon it - over and over and over again until it happens.

DON'T BE A COWARD, BE A CHRISTIAN - Lay your life on the line. St Paul went to great ends to keep an indigenous worshipping population alive in the Holy Land. We have to do that, too. This is our taproot community. Allow that to be killed and what will be the effect on the tree. Just because we lay our lives on the line to support our brothers and sisters does not mean they will be taken; it means that we are living our faith in the way all the great Christians of the world have always done - radically, responsibly and joyfully, full of life, full of power, full of love.

In the United States our faith has rarely been tested as a Christian people, as a Christian community united with brothers and sisters around the world. It is being tested now. Has our idleness made us soft, decadent, unfit for the service of Christ among us? Has it made our cowardice inevitable and irreversible? Hopefully not. Hopefully we sleepy, dreamy Christians will get out of bed tomorrow and say "The night is over." Hopefully we will rise up, get strong, walk through our fear and our uncertainty of exactly how to behave and say "Let them be free!" Hopefully we will walk into the actions that achieve that freedom for our family in Palestine. Hopefully we will say No! to our cowardice; and following Christ though risk and rain, say Yes! To the life he has prepared for us.