Lit Press: The Long Journey

The Long Journey takes us into the heart of Jerusalem—Mount Zion, the site of the Benedictine Dormition Monastery, a place where pilgrims, seekers, and peacemakers come for liturgies, prayer, and conversation. Our guide on this journey is James Paharik, who in nine closely woven essays, leads us through the labyrinthine spaces of Jerusalem, all the while digging through the layers of history to expose the rich stories that are the foundation of the city. We meet not only Jews and Palestinians but also Armenian and Ethiopian Christians, émigrés and expatriates, living and working in this polyglot place. Paharik reveals hearts damaged by violence but also brimming with hope that Israel will one day soon live up to her calling, as expressed in Psalm 76:
   In Judah God is known,
     his name is great in Israel.
   His abode has been established in Salem,
     his dwelling place in Zion.
   There he broke the flashing arrows,
     the shield, the sword, and the weapons of war.

James G. Paharik, PhD, is a member of the sociology faculty at Seton Hill University. He writes and teaches in the areas of comparative genocide and peace studies. Paharik is director of research and curriculum design for Beit Benedict Peace Academy and an oblate of Dormition Abbey, Jerusalem.

"To Jerusalem is given the promise that all nations will go up there to pray to God, the one true Lord of the world. In the course of history many peoples have gone up to Jerusalem in different waves and settled there. But Jerusalem is still far from being a city of peace. During his second stay in Dormition Abbey’s Beit Joseph, James Paharik examines in the course of many conversations the causes, prejudices, sociological and ethnic fault-lines, and human intransigencies of the situation. Along with many who live in the land itself and with idealists who come from outside, he goes in search of peace among the mixture of cultures and religions. In this he is supported not only by desire, but by a hope which is grounded in the fact that God himself works in us through his Spirit. For Paharik, the monks on Mount Zion become witnesses of this hope, a hope which will find concrete expression in the projected Beit Benedict, an academy for the promotion of peace among the adherents of the three abrahamic religions. If, like Mary, whose death is commemorated on this mountain, we open ourselves fully to God, then we shall no longer judge one another but discover one another in God."

-Dr. Notker Wolf, OSB, Abate Primate, Badia Primaziale S. Anselmo, Rome

"Prof. James Paharik combines an account of his journey of personal discovery of the present situation in Jerusalem and the Holy Land generally with the reflective analysis of a trained and observant sociologist and with his own spiritual meditation. His journey, as he notes, was also an interior one. Through numerous interviews with people from all walks of life and social levels he is able to portray realistically the painful divisions, wounds, and injustices present in all sectors of this society. As Paharik observes, the scientific method is inherently comparative (p. 53), and his comparisons with the wounds and injustices suffered in other societies in the recent past, particularly in the USA, are illuminating and offer some hope for possible solutions. This book is to be recommended to all who wish to understand better the problems of this area of the world, problems which continue to have extensive repercussions throughout the world. "

-Mark Sheridan, OSB, Rettore Magnifico, Pontificio Ateneo S.Anselmo, Rome

"I heartily recommend The Long Journey because it explores in a balanced way the historical and contemporary multi-layered tapestry of The Holy Land. Woven into this tapestry is the possibility of diminishing and even ending the present division of Jews and Arabs. Though today one has reason to be pessimistic about the outcome of this journey, in these pages we glimpse a future beyond the present impasse."

-Marc H. Ellis, Center for Jewish Studies, Baylor University

Publication Date: March 2009
Format: Paperback
Specifics: 152 pp., 5 3/8 x 8 1/4
ISBN: 978-0-8146-3221-5
Rights: World, English

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