Faceless and Nameless People
By the Rev Dr Munther Isaac, Evangelical Lutheran Pastor, Academic Dean of Bethlehem Bible College and Embrace Trustee
Modern Day Bethlehem.
A while ago, I was visiting an olive wood handicraft shop in Bethlehem to look for a gift to take to a partner church. While I was looking around, the artist recommended a statue of the holy family as refugees to me. It was like no other handicraft I had ever seen. The characters were faceless. There were heads, but no faces. I thought then, how symbolic!
I am not sure what the artist meant, but I saw a lot of meaning in this particular faceless holy family refugee portrait. For how many “faceless” and “nameless” people are there in our world today, people who are seeking refuge, safety, dignity and recognition? People who are only referred to as numbers and statistics, parts of headlines, victims of oppression, people who have become tools serving the interest of the mighty and rich—“faceless” and “nameless” people.
I think of the many refugees around our world today, and the many people displaced and besieged because of violence. I think of victims of the conflicts in Syria and Yemen today; I think of the faceless and nameless of Gaza.
As Palestinians, faceless and nameless pretty much defines how most people around the world perceive us. We are only viewed in reference to the “other” powerful side. Throughout history, empires occupied us, colonial powers promised and handed our land and homes to one another, and we were displaced, and displaced again. The powerful made declarations about our identity and rooted heritages; they made discriminatory laws; they saw an empty Palestine—a Jerusalem without Palestinians, even a Bethlehem without Christians. And for most Christians, our land is merely the stones of antiquities. Old historic churches, but no people—unless you are on their side, of course. We are faceless and nameless, not neighbors. We are pushed aside, irrelevant, on the other side of the wall.
Yet every Christmas season, we are reminded here in Bethlehem that Jesus is Immanuel—God with us, God as one of us. For he too became a victim of oppression. In his childhood, he had to survive a massacre. He then became just one more refugee among many other faceless and nameless refugees in our world. He was born into a simple and normal family; he was born in our little town, in a cave out of all places—as if to say, I recognize you! I know what you feel. I see your face. I know your name. I know your story. I share your experience.
Jesus came to us on our side of the wall. We became neighbors in the full sense of the world. For Palestinians, and for millions of oppressed and neglected people around the world, this is good news.
The olive wood statue I found in that shop has become a reminder to me that we exist as a church today, in Palestine and around the world, for the sake of the faceless and nameless—to walk in the footsteps of Jesus and defend, comfort, protect, and give value and worth to the vulnerable and neglected. If we do not move toward them, who will? And if we do not recognize them, who will?
This is an extract from Munther Isaac’s book, The Other Side of the Wall: Palestinian Christian Narrative of Lament and Hope, available to purchase now.