In this session, Rev. Dr. Mae Elise Cannon, CMEP’s executive director, speaks with Fr. Ramzi Sidawi OFM. He was born in Jerusalem in 1972. At the conclusion of his maturity studies he entered the Order of Friars Minor where he took his first vows in the year 1996 and the Solemn ones in the year 2000. After completing his formation and studies in Theology, he received Priestly Ordination in 2002, he spent a short period of service in the Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Transferred to Rome to complete his studies in Dogmatic Theology at the Pontifical University Antonianum, he graduated in 2006 and defended the doctoral thesis in 2010. While preparing to defend the thesis, he was appointed parish priest of the Parish of Saint Anthony of Padua in Jaffa – Tel Aviv, Israel. Along with this assignment, he also began teaching Dogmatic Theology in the Studium Theologicum Jerosolymitanum in Jerusalem. From 2013 to 2016 he was director of the Terra Santa Boys School in Jerusalem and from 2016 he is the General Administrator of the Custody of the Holy Land.
Merciful God, Grant us grace in abundance. The land of our Lord’s life and ministry is filled with violence, fear, and want. As followers of Jesus Christ, we wish to come together for good and for your glory. Grant us mercy as we share our pains, fears, and aspirations, that we may listen and better understand our brothers and sisters in Christ, while we pursue peace, justice, and restoration. May the walls that divide be turned, becoming a table by which we seek communion with one another, and with you. In this spirit of unity, we pray together the prayer of humble access: We do not presume to come to this thy table, O merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in your abundant mercy. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under your table. But you are the same Lord whose eternal nature is to have mercy. Grant us therefore, gracious Lord, that we may eat the flesh of thy dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood, that we may continually dwell in him, and he in us. Amen.