Religious leaders pray in Jerusalem for end of coronavirus pandemic

The leaders who gathered on the terrace of the King David Hotel in the capital overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem read the same prayer jointly in their respective liturgical languages.

By JEREMY SHARON
Joint prayer for world health in Jerusalem on April 22, 2020 (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Joint prayer for world health in Jerusalem on April 22, 2020
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Chief Rabbis, patriarchs, archbishops, imams, and sheikhs assembled together in Jerusalem Wednesday afternoon to recite a joint prayer to God to alleviate the suffering experienced around the world by the coronavirus pandemic.
The leaders who gathered on the terrace of the King David Hotel in the capital overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem read the same prayer jointly in their respective liturgical languages requesting divine mercy.
“God, You who have nourished us in famine and provided us with plenty, You have removed us from pestilence, and freed us from severe and long-lasting disease - Help us,” prayer the religious leaders.
“Until now, Your mercy has aided us and Your kindness has not abandoned us, therefore we plead and request before You to heal us, Lord and we will be healed, Save us and we will be saved, for You are our glory.”
Those present included Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef; Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau; Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem Theophilos III; Apostolic Administrator of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa; head of the Organization of Imams from Southern Israel Imam Sheikh Jamal el Ubra, Imam Sheikh Agel Al-Atrash and Druze Spiritual leader Sheikh Mowafaq Tarif.
The religious leaders also spoke out against xenophobia and racism which they said the coronavirus pandemic had exacerbated.
Following the joint recitation of the prayer, Lau commented that the Bible refers to Jerusalem as a house of prayer for all peoples.
“The disease does not distinguish between Jews and non-Jews, men or women, so we came to stand together and in different languages but with one heart [before] God to ask for the epidemic to stop, for the ill to recover, the healthy not to become sick and for joy to return to our world,” said Lau.
Yosef stated that “Everything is from God” and that “Everything God does is for the best,” adding that the pandemic required mankind to “waken ourselves and strengthen ourselves in our relationship between man and his fellow and between man and God, and pray to God to stop this disease.”
Pizzaballa also noted the Bible’s description of Jerusalem as a house of prayer for all peoples, and said that it was therefore important “that we here in Jerusalem pray for all the people together, noting that the pandemic “knows no borders of race, religion or political borders.”

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Continued Pizzaballa “But this situations has allowed something quite rate, for Jews Muslims and Christians, to say the same prayer together, And i hope this continues after the coronavirus [epidemic] because we need here in Jerusalem to pray altogether for all the peoples of the world.”


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