On June 20, the annual Living Letters service-learning trip to the Ramallah Friends School departs for an experience of just over two weeks. The interfaith and intergenerational group will first visit the Galilee on its way to Ramallah. There they will stay at the Melkite school of Abuna Elias Chacour, learning about the lives of Palestinian Arabs in Israel, before touring the Sea of Galilee area and visiting an Israeli kibbutz on the Lebanon/Syria border.
The trip to Ramallah will take the group through the Jordan Valley to Jericho and the Dead Sea Scrolls community of Qumran before ascending the Palestinian highlands into Ramallah. Staying at the Ramallah Friends Upper School campus, the group will do service projects at the Friends Meetinghouse and at the two campuses of the Lower and Upper Schools.
Along with service, the learning part will include meetings with Israelis and Palestinians engaged in peace and justice work, evenings with families whose children have attended Quaker colleges in the U.S., worshiping with the Quaker community, and attending Friday prayers at a local mosque. Time in Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Hebron, and area villages will further add to the group’s experience of the rich religious, political, and cultural history of the area.
Max and Jane Carter of North Carolina Yearly Meeting have led this annual FUM-sponsored trip for decades, and have indicated that they will only be available for a few more years before they retire from this particular ministry. Friends who wish to be informed when the 2018 registration opens can send their contact details to Lisa Scarpelli at lisas@fum.org.
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