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Submitted November 22, 2004

Take Off Your Shoes at Sinai

By Maria C. Khoury

“Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground” (Exodus 3:5). And as Moses removed his shoes before the Burning Bush, so do Christian pilgrims continue to remove their shoes as they enter this holiest place at the Monastery of St. Catherine in the heart of the Sinai Desert. This spectacular Orthodox monastic center has been there for over 1400 years since the time of Justinian (527-565). It is the oldest, continuously-inhabited Christian monastery in the world. It is visited not just by Christians but by Jews and Muslims as well. It is simply an amazing location where the Children of Israel wandered thirty-three centuries ago.

When many places in the Holy Land were destroyed, the Monastery of St. Catherine has never been conquered, damaged or destroyed. To this day, it has kept its image as a sacred Biblical site. Aside from the small monastic community in the middle of the desert, you find just the Bedouins who work at the monastery. After twenty some years of traveling to the Holy Land, I finally had the greatest blessing to venerate the relics of Saint Catherine, one of the great martyrs for Christ. Here God revealed Himself to Moses in the miracle of the Burning Bush and ordered him to return to Egypt, and bring the Children of Israel to serve Him.

All my appreciation goes to Fr. Panteleimon from Holy Transfiguration Monastery of Brookline, Massachusetts, who took me with his pilgrims who he continues to bring to the Holy Land even during these tragic years of bloodshed. Fr. Panteleimon and Mother Seraphima from the Nativity Convent are some of the brave souls that I know who continue to lead pilgrimages to the Holy Land even in the last four years of the constant cycle of escalating violence. However, I have not been successful at getting the group to visit our village of Taybeh, the only all-Christian village left in Palestine. It seems they travel with fear but with love for our Lord and Savior in walking His footsteps in this Holy Land.

When so many Christians in the Holy Land make their living from pilgrims traveling here, it is the greatest solidarity and support to travel to the Holy Land during these critical times in support of the small Christian community that is struggling to exist. Fr. Panteleimon literally knows people who tell him that they did not serve lunch to a pilgrim group since his last visit the previous year. Just imagine how thrilled they are seeing these pilgrims.

Saint Catherine is actually featured for the month of November in my children’s book, Christina’s Favorite Saints. Since I had never traveled to this amazing monastery before, I was grateful and thrilled to join the pilgrims. Tradition tells us that angles transported Saint Catherine’s body after she was executed to the peak of the highest mount in Sinai, which now bears her name. It literally takes three hours to climb up from the present monastery to the original chapel at the peak of Mt. Sinai where Saint Catherine’s body was found. But, when the pilgrims do this climb at three in the morning, they see the most unbelievable and fascinating sunrise over the horizon when they get to the top. You cannot help but give glory to God.

The rocks and the shapes of the mountain are indescribable like no other place in the world. Fr. Nicholas tried to mention this fact to everyone before arriving, but it is a site that takes your breath away. The colors of the mountain peak are different shades of pink, red and lavender. You look around and you feel the rocks are talking to you, echoing the voice of God in the beauty and the splendor of earthly creation. When pilgrims visit here for the first time, they are truly in for a surprise of the physical and spiritual beauty and splendor. I actually walked up the holy mountain with people like Evangelia from Australia who has made the climb six times. The six times is not as amazing as her age, which is more than six decades.

Now I can understand how Saint Helen was able to build so many churches and help preserve our Christian roots in the Holy Land in her late age. Tradition tells us that Saint Helen must have been over sixty years of age when she found the True Cross in Jerusalem. To be fair, I must mention that George from Canada was also past sixty years of age. Living examples were in front of my eyes of women and men giving glory to God by venerating such a holy site. My faith was deeply reinforced by the witness of others.

The Icon Gallery exhibits 150 out of 2,000 priceless icons of immense spiritual, artistic and historic value. In the past some of these icons have gone on exhibition in Athens and New York as treasures from the Holy Monastery of Saint Catherine. The Library of the Monastery is second in importance only to that of the Vatican, in both number and value of the manuscripts it contains. What is very interesting about some of the historical documents is that they contain the original gold seal of emperors, patriarchs, bishops and Turkish sultans. Apart from its valuable manuscripts, the Library also contains some 5,000 books, some of them produced during the early days of the invention of printing.

Although it took me over twenty years to get to an internationally significant place practically next-door to me, you can make it here this year. Encourage your local church to express solidarity and support with Palestinian Christians by not forgetting about the precious and holy sites and the precious living stones that continue to give glory to God for over two thousand years in a land that will always require Christian suffering and witness, because the Lord died on the Cross for our sins so that we may have eternal life. And if our Lord and Savior can sustain the suffering of the crucifixion, we therefore can meet the challenges in our daily lives all meant to come close to God and learn to give glory to our Lord and Savior.

Note: I must thank Holy Transfiguration Monastery not only for the blessed trip to Sinai but for permission to reprint the Byzantine icons of seven women saints from their collection in my new book in print, Christina’s Heroes. Thank you very much Fr. Panteleimon. May all glory be to God.



Volume 6 Number 48 - Tuesday, November 30th, 2004	A Publication of the ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN LAITY