Celebrating Christmas in Israel’s ancient Greek Catholic villages
Residents of Fassuta and Mi’ilya build communal bridges with Israeli neighbors, and call for peace in Middle East.
The Media Line|Published: 12.23.18 , 19:12
Christmas in Israel offers a vast array of options for those celebrating: from overflowing markets to special concerts to processions in ancient cities. But for adventurous travelers in the Holy Land seeking an alternative to the crowded Christmas scenes in Bethlehem and Nazareth, there are perhaps no better places to explore than Fassuta and Mi'ilya, two tiny Christian villages located off the beaten path in the western Galilee, an area seldom visited by tourists.
Mi’ilya and Fassuta are the only two Greek Catholic—or Melkite—towns in all of Israel. The Melkites trace their roots to the Christians of the 1st century in Antioch, a former Greek city located in what is presently Turkey and where Saint Peter introduced Christianity. The Melkite Church splintered from the Greek Orthodox Church in the mid-18th century and its adherents today, most of whom reside in the Levant, number some 1.6 million people.
https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5431903,00.html
