In this Easter season, we at Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology
Center extend our greetings to all our friends everywhere who stand with us,
pray for us and support us. Easter is always special because it celebrates
victory and triumph following the agony of crucifixion and death.
The events of crucifixion, death, and resurrection correspond to the
experience of many oppressed people in the world. The oppressed, like Jesus, are led, chained, beaten, spat upon, ridiculed, crucified,
and killed. They live under many unjust systems of domination that control and
oppress them. Injustice is always dehumanizing because it strips people from
their God-given humanity and reduces them to less than God has created them to
be. Oppressors live in the illusion that they have the final word about those
they oppress. The oppressors believe they can do anything because they have the
power to control and determine the destiny of others, as did the religious and
political leaders of Jesus' day. They were sure that they had finished him.
Their final verdict for Jesus was torture, death, and oblivion. Yet God's final
word was resurrection and life. God raised him from the dead and he is alive
forever more. It is God who will not allow injustice
to have the upper hand. The Apostle Paul can, therefore, shout, "Thanks be
to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Corinthians
This is meaningful for us Palestinians because we have been going
through our "week" of passion and are looking for the bright dawn of
Easter. We need to live in the hope that the end of injustice and oppression is
near and the promise of Easter and new life is approaching.
We thank God for all of our friends who believe that the chains of
oppression must be broken and who have committed themselves to see the triumph
of the power of justice and liberation.
From the city of the Resurrection, we wish you a Happy Easter.
Christ is Risen.
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