One of the girls in my program is Christian, or as she puts it, a Believer. In her faith, people do not get baptized until they make the decision to accept the religion. Through the church that she attends here, she got the opportunity to be baptized here in Israel. This was a really special moment for her, especially in land that is also holy for Christians. She had been very supportive of our Jewish beliefs over the last year, learning as much as she could and participating in our celebrations of holidays. So a group of us went to Jerusalem to support her on this significant occasion. The service & sermon were in Hebrew, but there was also a Russian translator, a signer and a nice man from Katie's church who translated to English for us. Because it was in Hebrew, though, there were times that I had to remind myself that these people were not Jewish. There is such a connection between the language and the religion in my head. Katie had to answer questions about why she chose to be baptized now and I was very proud that she did it all in Hebrew, because while she knew the questions ahead of time, she wasn't sure which they would ask her. (She's my buddy in Hebrew class.) Though the service was long, it was nice. Katie wasn't the only one being baptized that day. They had a little band and 2 groups of kids (one older, one younger) performed songs for them.
Afterward, we all went to the old city and ate lunch. The hummus place we wanted to go to was too small for all of us (16!), so we just picked the next place we saw, which was an Arab restaurant where we HAD to speak in English because they didn't speak Hebrew. It was a bit of a contrast to the Hebrew speaking Christians we met earlier.
Pictures from the day are at: Various December Events
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