A church watch-cat

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Guardian of the threshold?
A cat sits atop the gate next to a church in old Jaffa.

Immanuel Church was built in 1904 in Jaffa's American/German Colony. 
Its history is so interesting, and unique. 

The Protestant church holds services on Saturday in Hebrew and English.
On Sundays only in English. 

Linking this post to Camera-Critters and inSPIREd Sunday memes.
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UPDATE: Just learned that today is Cat Day (well, in America at least).  Happy Cat Day! 
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Pioneering Protestants in Jerusalem

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For today's That's My World let's look at a disappearing world.
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The Israeli army guard would not let me in the gate to photograph back in November 2008.
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Written in stone on the building are the Arabic and the German for "Syrian Orphanage."
The place is popularly known as the Schneller School or Schneller Compound.
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I could only get pictures through the perimeter fence and the barbed wire.
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Some of the buildings are roofless.
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Some are gone.

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The army, which had used the compound since 1948, moved out two years ago.

The plan is to build 600 apartments for the neighboring haredim (ultra-orthodox Jews).

The Jerusalem municipality talks of preserving some of the beautiful old European-style buildings and using them as public buildings or a museum.

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By chance, a wooden crate was recently found inside the old church.

In it was the original stone altar from 1860!

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Last night, at the symposium I showed in yesterday's post, the altar was brought to the Church of the Ascension on Mount of Olives to be installed and rededicated there, at Augusta Victoria.

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You can get an idea of the history and the great meaning of the Schneller School(s) for the German Protestants (and also see old photos of the orphanage and Johann Schneller and the kids) by looking at the PDF program of the international symposium, "Schneller--a living heritage in the Middle East."

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The history in brief:

Schneller was sent to Jerusalem as a missionary from a Swiss village in 1854.

From the Arabs of Lifta he bought plots of land and started building.

He and his wife and 4 apprentices became the first Europeans to live outside the protective Old City walls.

They rescued orphans following the 1860 Druze and Muslim massacre of 30,000 Maronite Christians in Lebanon.

The children (up to 180 orphans at its peak) found a new home and a fine school in Schneller's Syrian Orphanage.

Schneller's son and then his grandson carried on his work.

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In World War II all Germans and Austrians were deported from Palestine; many were sent to Australia.

The British Army took over the compound.

When the British Mandate ended in 1948, they handed the compound to the IDF.

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To read the whole fascinating story, please see this good Jerusalem Post article.

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Today the Schneller tradition of holistic education for peace and for future leaders continues at their two schools, in Lebanon and in Jordan.

And they still teach German.

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UPDATE Oct. 2020:  https://www.israel21c.org/landmark-building-to-house-new-museum-celebrating-jewish-heritage/

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Bridges and benches in the Garden Tomb

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British General Charles Gordon literally lost his head at the hands of Mahdist rebels in the Sudan, in the ill-fated defense of Khartoum.

But in Israel he is better known for having "discovered" Gordon's Calvary.
Three holes in the cliff, when seen from afar, make it look like a skull, i.e. Golgotha in Aramaic, the "place of the skull" mentioned in the New Testament as where Jesus was crucified.

And just on the other side of where the fence now stands, Gordon discovered an ancient tomb.
He decided that this, and not the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, was the true place of the crucifixion and burial.

Most scholars do not agree.
But this did not stop popular Protestant piety from making the site, today called the Garden Tomb, into the most moving place for prayer and meditation for non-Catholic pilgrims.

Group after group stands in line to enter the small room of the tomb for a brief minute.

In any one of the many clusters of benches you can hear hymns rising, or sermons, or readings from the Gospels--in Finnish or Spanish or African languages or even English.

Several bridges make large parts of the garden handicapped accessible.

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Here's a picture for both Louis' Sunday Bridges and the bench-blogging friends.

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The old arches are more graceful than the modern straight lines.

The bench-groupings are everywhere, each with its own altar.

Each table is ready with the Communion elements.

The Garden is owned and administered by The Garden Tomb (Jerusalem) Association, a Charitable Trust based in the United Kingdom. There virtual tour is here.

The exit from the Garden Tomb is through the gift shop.

For pictures of inside the tomb and of the surroundings and of the huge cistern, see Sacred Destinations and BiblePlaces.com.

UPDATE: Dear readers, please see my clarification of some things in the Comments section.
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(Linking to inSPIRED Sunday.)
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