Peter Abu Farha carves a mother-of-pearl seashell into a broach at his shop in Bethlehem, where Jesus was born (Submitted photo).

By Liz Quirin

For The Messenger

“Oh little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie, above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by … the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”

Christmas is coming and people are making plans, looking forward to visiting family members near and far. Awad Qumseya will be packing soon to see his relatives, too. He comes from Bethlehem, near the Shepherds’ Field.

“It’s the same area of Boaz, where he met Ruth,” Awad said. “It’s where David became a prophet.”

Awad, president of Blest Art (blestart.com), a company headquartered in Omaha, Neb., has a connection to the Diocese of Belleville and many other dioceses in this country. Representatives from the company visited St. Nicholas Parish in O’Fallon recently to display and sell olive wood carvings by craftsmen in Bethlehem, as well as other pieces of art.

Fr. Nick Junker, pastor at St. Nicholas, said he knew about the company and the crafts.

“Parishioners are very moved by the craftsmanship of the works themselves but also by the testimony given by our guests,” Fr. Nick said.

Awad’s father, Jeryes, opened Blest Art to support Bethlehem’s craftsmen. With conflicts arising between Israelis and Muslims over many years, the number of Palestinian Christians was shrinking to its present level of less than 1% in the country.

“The discrimination and violence that Christians face in the Holy Land isn’t often considered or discussed,” Fr. Nick said.

Awad said: “Christians in the Holy Land want to live in peace.”

And to remain in the Holy Land, they must be able to make a living. This is the purpose of Blest Art — to support the craftsmen who are living witnesses of Christianity. According to its website: “Blest Art’s work brings the advantage of being able to reach out beyond borders with uniquely, real, tangible and effective help. It is more than a hand-out as a collection plate would be; it is a hand-up for the Christians who want to live in peace and support their families with a centuries-old trade and way of life.”

Awad, who grew up watching his father learn to carve and eventually opened his own shop, is also a master carver although he lives in this country now. He said his father encouraged one of his cousins to become a carver.

“Olive wood is hard; it is not easy to carve,” he said when asked if many women were also carvers. “My cousin was not good in school. My father recruited him to be a carver.”

Not many younger men are becoming wood carvers, Awad said.

“The younger generation is not that interested,” he said. “You need patience” to learn wood carving.

As he prepares to spend Christmas in Bethlehem, Awad said his “biggest hope is that there will be a permanent peace” in the Holy Land. “We have to learn to share this land with each other instead of fighting each other,” he said.

So many times throughout its history, wars have destroyed peace and changed the balance of power in the Holy Land from the Six-Day War in 1967 when the West Bank, where Bethlehem is located, was captured from Jordan. Other areas were captured, too, including the Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights, among others.

In 1987, Arabs declared the first Intifada, a holy war of resistance. That resistance takes on many forms, including violent ones. A second Intifada was declared in 2000, with Palestinians resisting Israeli occupation. A civil uprising quickly became violent, and then in October 2023, Hamas launched an attack that came to be known as the Gaza War, with kidnappings and killings. A tenuous peace is still holding, although nothing is settled.

Conflicts continue, but Christmas will still come. For the sake of those Palestinian Christians in the Holy Land, Awad hopes peace will overtake war.

The ”Little Town of Bethlehem” is real, and so are its people. The Christmas song may conjure warm and happy memories, but the real people of Bethlehem work every day to make sure their families can be safe and whole at a time when many people in their region live precariously or die tragically. Their “hopes and fears” continue, as do those of people around the world who care about what happens to them and to this world.

For more information about the craftsmen of Bethlehem, visit blestart.com.