Guarding sacred spaces in Syria and Iraq where Christians and Muslims unify in prayer
Fr. Jens Petzold
I belong to a small Christian monastic community of nuns and monks who contemplate Islam and interact with its different currents. Our community was founded in 1991, after the restoration of Deir [Monastery] Mar Musa in Syria. The site is an old sacred one, named after Mar Musa al-Habashi [Saint Moses the Abyssinian]. Already in the 6th century it was inhabited by hermits.
Since 2000, we have opened other monasteries as well: Deir Mar Elian in Quaryatayn, Syria; San Salvatore in Cori, Italy, close to Rome; and Deir Maryam al-Adhra in Sulaymaniyah, in the Kurdish Region of Iraq. And since Fr. Paolo Dall’Oglio, our founder, dedicated his life to the mystery of Islam in relation to Christianity, all of our monasteries uphold his vision.
From the outset, our dedication to hospitality and dialogue raised the fundamental question of how to care for and guard sacred spaces in an ecumenical and multi-religious context.
During his retreat in the summer of 1982 in the ruins of Deir Mar Musa, Fr. Paolo received the spiritual insight that Mar Musa could become a living community again if there were a community cultivating prayer, manual work, and hospitality there in the horizon of Christ’s love for Islam. He set out to begin the restoration and foundation of our present community.
When Fr. Paolo first came to Deir Mar Musa, it had already long been considered a sacred site by the local community of Muslims and Christians. The fruits of the fig tree at the base of the monastery were considered a sure remedy against childlessness, and the Wali [a Muslim term for Saint] Musa, or Mar [Saint] Musa [Moses], would grant intercession for various sorrows.
Even more explicit in this sense was the “sanctuary” quality of the Monastery Mar Elyan [Saint Julian], where Muslims and Christians alike would ask for healing from mental illnesses. Here, both Muslims and Christians would ask for consolation and help in the chapel of the tomb of Mar Elyan.
San Salvatore, the abandoned church we received from the Bishop of Latina to establish a community, had been very popular for funerals, since the site seemed to provide a particular consolation. And shepherds would bring their sorrows and joys to the interior side chapel where there is a very fine painting of Saint Mary of the Carmel.
When I came to Sulaymaniyah and started Deir Maryam al-Adhra [the monastery of Virgin Mary], I discovered that the courtyard niche with a little statuette of Mary was and is frequently visited by Christian and Muslim women asking for intercession either to bear a child or for protection from disease.
The Maryam al-Adhra monastery is the old parish church. Here, we have to deal with a more closed society and, while there are Muslim and Christian women alike lighting candles for their thanks and wishes, it is not a sanctuary. One needs to handle the community whose site it is with respect. The church, however, is no longer the community parish church, so there is slow development towards it becoming a space for possible encounter. For this to succeed, it is important for the local Christian community to feel itself not excluded but rather essential.
These experiences are not isolated. There is much to be said about sanctuaries in the Middle East. While many of these today hold significance for their respective religious groups alone, there are, on the other hand, a surprising number of Christian sanctuaries that carry great significance for Muslim popular belief. In Syria, for example, we find many Muslims visiting ancient Christian sanctuaries for religious and spiritual reasons, such as that dedicated to Saint Mary in Saydnaya or that to Saint Tekla in Maaloula. In recent times, the number of Christians and Muslims visiting the small Christian sanctuary Soufanieh in Damascus or our own two monasteries, Deir Mar Musa and Deir Mar Elyan, has been equal.
Some sacred sites, like that of the Umayyad Mosque of Damascus, which was previously the site of a Basilica dedicated to Saint John the Baptist and, prior to that, the site of the Temple of Jupiter, and prior still, the site of the temple of Hadad-Ramman, are closely tied to the respective rulers of their time: each new ruler needs to “own” the place.(*)
Why is it that many Christian sacred sites hold significance for other religions? One reason is certainly that many of the sanctuaries themselves are much older than Christianity. Saydnaya was always a place of worship for the female goddess Ishtar/Artemis/Diana. Today, it is probably the oldest Marian sanctuary in the world. Many high places dedicated to the sun god, be it Elagabal [Lord of the Mountain] or Helios, became Christian sanctuaries dedicated to the prophet Elijah.
These old sites have deep cultural, ethnic, and spiritual roots that express themselves independently of the doctrine. Another reason, moreover, is the particular attitude taken by those who are the custodians, or guardians, of these sites. The Christian approach to sacred sites seems, for the most part, to be quite similar to the Christian approach to the sacred scripture: the text is to be guarded in the form as close as possible as it was received by the first Christian communities, without censorship of inconvenient parts, for we do not want reduce its inner deposit of faith.
Likewise, the custodians of a site guard the essential nature and beauty of its sacred nucleus. They provide and guard access to that sacred nucleus for everyone. This requires a certain humbleness and an abstinence from judgment: both toward the site itself and towards the visiting pilgrim. Ideally, the guardians develop confidence in the transformational force of “their” sacred site. The general attitude of many custodians of Christian sacred sites is to not seek to demand a theological or dogmatic “correct” response from the visitor or pilgrim, but rather to encourage an intuitive personal response of faith, since the sacred place continually challenges us to attune to it on a spiritual level.
While a sacred space is not tied to a doctrine per se, it cannot, however, be neutral. Its custodians need a clear identity. They need to have made their decision of faith. If not, they will not be able to deal with the site’s inherent spiritual challenge. My experience with Deir Mar Musa, for example, is that this site in particular will not tolerate indifference toward the divine.(**)
So what are the actual choices of our community?
At Deir Mar Musa, for Muslim visitors, the wall in the direction of Mecca has been left bare, without icons, so they can pray there. When we held conferences or large group meetings at the monastery and prayer times conflicted, we would pitch a Bedouin Tent on our big terrace — which some of our guests found really enchanting. The identity of the monastery always remains Christian, but with a warm welcoming of guests that might bring new insights about God.
In fact, our manner of receiving of people is very simple: water, a cup of tea, and a little conversation. In any case, I recall that when I was new in Deir Mar Musa, I was, yes, bringing water and pouring tea, but those actually receiving our guests were our elder members: Fr. Paolo and Fr. Jacques Mourad, or Sr. Elena Bolognesi. Often, I just listened to them… and learned.
We try to be well prepared to receive guests of very different backgrounds. The first step is to find our own inner stability so as to face a continuous change of people, with their different opinions and behaviours. The challenge, at times, is to find the love of being a host.
Other preparation for guardianship lies in developing a strong formation in one’s own faith and, at least a good general knowledge about, in our case, Islam. In our community, we do this through weeks of reflection and study on certain theological and moral matters, the teachings of the Church, and writings on spiritual thematics, which we organise internally for ourselves and for those who may be interested. Of course, there are also academic studies.
In any case, we have found that for a site that is shared and frequented by multiple confessions and religions, the most important ingredient lies in the example of hospitality inspired by that of Abraham: We always expect God to visit us through our guests. It is then up to us to understand when to listen, when to offer relief, when to provide nourishment, or when to intercede.(***)
This article was first published in ‘Om en Rondom’ (bisdom bij de Krijgsmacht), 2020–2.
Notes
(*) This might lead us into a reflection on the current debate about the Aya Sofia in Istanbul: To a certain extent, this is also true for Aya Sofia in Istanbul. Over the centuries, Constantinople was an important objective to defeat, spiritually and politically, and its spiritual symbol was the Aya Sofia. For the Turks in the 15th century, it was essential to “own” this place. It was only made museum as part of a great plan to break the power of Islamic clerics in Turkey.
(**) Rev 3:15. This might also lead us into a further reflection on the Aya Sophia in Istanbul: If we agree that Aya Sofia is truly a sacred site, then it cannot be a museum. I believe that, apart from all the different reasons tied to politics and power, this point should be taken into careful consideration in the discussion. Must it be church or mosque? Can it be used by both communities, like the site of the Umayyad Mosque in the years following the Muslim conquest of Damascus? Would a chapel in one of the parts of Aya Sofia be acceptable for the local Christians? And for the Muslims?
(***) Gen 18
