Archbishop Thabo Makgoba - Sabeel Conference – Sermon
"God, Faithfulness, and Resistance"
Church of All Nations / Church of Gethesmane
25 February 2011
Note from Naim Ateek:
This will be a simple service of song, readings, and prayer that will last one hour including your sermon.
As you know the theme of the conference is Challenging Empire: God, Faithfulness, and Resistance. The suggestion is to use the subtitle as the topic for the sermon, i.e. "God, Faithfulness, and Resistance." We believe that your experience in South Africa is very relevant to us as Palestinians.
And it is your people's faith in God that guided their resistance in the struggle. Our people, as well as our international friends need a word of encouragement and hope and a challenge to make a difference in their own context. Our people feel great affinity with South Africa and I believe they (and our international participants) welcome your words, stories, and illustrations that sustained you along the journey for justice and freedom. The setting of the Garden of Gethsemane is very conducive because it reminds people of Jesus' agony and suffering at the hands of empire and its collaborators. With these thoughts you may use the topic we are suggesting or a topic that you may feel to be more appropriate. I would suggest that the time frame needs to be between 15 to 20 minutes.
