The birthplace of Jesus Christ is only about five miles from Israel’s capital. But as the war between Israel and Hamas wages on, Bethlehem and Jerusalem are worlds apart.

While Jerusalem and Bethlehem are both the home of sacred sites for Christians, they stand on opposite sides of a restricted border, and travel to and from Bethlehem, which is governed by the Palestinian National Authority, has been kept to a minimum. 

For Palestinian and Israeli Christians who have been seeking to foster community across national and ethnic lines, the war has hampered their efforts. But it has not stifled their hope. 

One of those Christians, Palestinian Pastor Ziyad Bannoura, recently spoke to ChurchLeaders about his experiences before and during the war, sharing his hope for peace and unity.

For more than two decades, Bannoura has been serving as a minister in Bethlehem. For the past two years, he has led The Great Joy Ministry, whose purpose is “to restore the hope and joy in the hearts of people.” 

While he has lived in Palestinian Bethlehem his whole life, Bannoura received his Master of Arts in Christian Ministry from Israel College of the Bible and has long striven to forge connections with Israeli Christians.

“I have many Jewish friends, especially believers,” Bannoura said. “Now, I cannot see them.” 

On Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas began the war by launching a terrorist attack against Israel, Bannoura was in America visiting family and raising support for his ministry. When he returned to Bethlehem in February, he discovered that “the situation is very awful for people here.”

“The city is under closure,” Bannoura said, adding that unemployment has risen sharply, as many residents of Bethlehem were previously employed in Jerusalem but have not been allowed to enter the city. 

Those who work in Bethlehem have also experienced financial hardship, as the city’s economy is largely built around tourism—something that has not been a feature of life in Bethlehem for the past six months. 

RELATED: Injured Israeli Reservists Join Jerusalem Marathon, Share What They Wish the World Knew About the War

“Now, nobody’s coming and things are very bad,” Bannoura said. “Even with the people that used to have money, they don’t have money.” Bannoura said that some restrictions are beginning to loosen, but “it’s not enough.” 

VATICAN CITY (RNS) — In a new document on human dignity issued Monday (April 8), the Vatican’s department that guides Catholic doctrine reinforced the church’s opposition to abortion, surrogacy, gender theory and any attempt to change one’s sex.

“Desiring a personal self-determination, as gender theory prescribes, apart from this fundamental truth that human life is a gift, amounts to a concession to the age-old temptation to make oneself God,” the document states.

Gender theory, the document said, “intends to deny the greatest possible difference that exists between living beings: sexual difference.” It also stated that “all attempts to obscure reference to the ineliminable sexual difference between man and woman are to be rejected.”

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The declaration, titled “Dignitas Infinita,” or “Infinite Dignity,” has been in the works at the Vatican for five years and went through several drafts and iterations before the final document was accepted by the Congregation for Doctrine of the Faith and by Pope Francis, whose approval gives it the weight of official doctrine.

The title of the document is drawn from a speech delivered by Pope John Paul II to a group of disabled individuals in Germany in 1980, and the document itself was signed by Francis on the 19^th anniversary of John Paul’s death, on April 2.

After a long explanation of the church’s understanding of what it calls the “inalienable and intrinsic” dignity of each human being, which it said exists from the beginning of human existence and cannot be revoked, the document quickly analyzes issues challenging human dignity today.

The declaration asserts that sex-change surgery, also known as gender-affirming surgery, “risks threatening the unique dignity the person has received from the moment of conception.”

It also says that the church “takes a stand against the practice of surrogacy,” when a woman carries a child for another person, “through which the immensely worthy child becomes a mere object.” Children “have the right to have a fully human (and not artificially induced) origin,” the document stated, adding that “the legitimate desire to have a child cannot be transformed into a ‘right to a child’ that fails to respect the dignity of that child as the recipient of the gift of life.”

The document also underlined the church’s opposition to abortion and euthanasia, while also stressing the importance of defending the inherent dignity of people living with disabilities, the elderly and those living at the margins of society, especially the poor.

It equally condemned wars and policies that leave individuals deprived of human dignity.

The pronouncement’s positions are ones the church has long held and that Francis has often confirmed. Francis has referred to gender theory as “a form of ideological colonization” that attempts to eliminate key differences in humans, and he has excoriated its concepts as Western propaganda. The pope has called surrogacy “despicable” and damaging for women, especially those living in poverty, and Vatican representatives at the United Nations have called for a global ban of the practice.

(RNS) — Christina Marea, a nurse midwife, wasn’t surprised when she saw the report from National Nurses United warning that Ascension, one of the largest Catholic health care providers in the U.S., was accelerating a trend of slashing labor and delivery units from its offerings.

In 2017, Ascension closed the labor and delivery unit at Providence Hospital in Washington, where Marea worked. Marea said that Ascension gave 60 days’ notice of the closure without coordinating with nearby facilities to make sure they could handle increased patient volume or creating a transfer plan for patients, simply handing them a list of hospitals.

Marea, now an assistant professor in midwifery at Georgetown University’s School of Nursing, said that Ascension had underinvested in Providence for years before the closure.

RELATED: The Strange World of Catholic ‘Integralism’—And Christian Nationalism

She remembers nurses begging Ascension for more than two baby warmers for the 12-bed unit. “We would have nurses running down the hallway, sterilizing them while they ran to get from one delivery to the next,” she said.

Providence served Black and poor patients and had the only labor and delivery unit with 24/7 access to a Spanish-speaking provider, according to Marea.

But when Ascension closed the unit, two years before it closed the hospital entirely, Marea said, “it was devastating.”

While labor and delivery units are disappearing at hospitals nationally, some health care experts have pointed out that Ascension has the resources to buck that trend. Both industry analysts and the nonprofit’s obstetric nurses are questioning whether Ascension is upholding Catholic values and those of the U.S. Catholic bishops who called for more robust maternity care before the 2022 Dobbs ruling ended the right to an abortion.

The labor and delivery closures do not “represent a culture of life that the Catholic Church and the Catholic health facilities are promoting,” said Marea.

“Historically, the Catholic hospitals have had a better reputation, mostly because of their mission,” said Jean Ross, a co-president of National Nurses United, a union that recently began representing Ascension nurses in Baltimore; Austin, Texas; and Wichita, Kansas.

Ascension closed labor and delivery departments at a higher rate than the national average from 2012 to 2021, according to a January report by the union, and to date has shuttered more than 26% of its units that existed in 2012. The closures disproportionately occurred in areas with high poverty rates and in Black and Latino communities, according to NNU’s research, populations that already face higher infant and maternal mortality.

The system’s mission statement, citing “the loving ministry of Jesus as healer,” says it is dedicated “to serving all persons with special attention to those who are poor and vulnerable.”

Ascension Seton Medical Center Austin in Austin, Texas. (Photo courtesy Ascension)

Ascension, which in recent years has had upwards of $15 billion in cash reserves, had been accused of other strategic decisions that prioritized profitability over the system’s mission. Pointing to closures of “safety-net hospitals” and its outside investments, STAT News characterized Ascension in 2021 as “moonlighting as a private equity firm.”

Ge Bai, professor of accounting and health care policy and management at Johns Hopkins University, said that hospitals intent on maximizing profitability will make cuts to low-margin obstetrics and gynecology services, especially where many patients are on Medicaid.

A 2022 New York Times investigation revealed that Ascension’s executives get paid more when the system has higher excess revenue. Those strong financial metrics allow Ascension to expand further.

In a nail-biting final game, South Carolina continued its undefeated season and won over Iowa to become the 2024 NCAA women’s basketball champions.

Before the game, South Carolina Coach Dawn Staley answered questions in a press conference about her strategy, her passion for the players, and her support of trans athletes in women’s basketball.

“So, now the barnstormer people are going to flood my timeline and be a distraction to me on one of the biggest days of our game,” Staley said during the press conference. “And I’m okay with that. I really am.”

NCAA Women’s Basketball Coach Dawn Staley Is Open About Her Faith and Inclusion of Trans Athletes

South Carolina won the NCAA women’s basketball championship game back in 2022 and made it to the Final Four in 2023. This year, they took back the title. The championship game against the Iowa Hawkeyes was a close one. In the last few minutes, Iowa came within three points of South Carolina, but the Gamecocks powered through and won with a 12-point lead, 87 to 75.

Staley has coached the women’s basketball team for the Gamecocks for 16 years with a remarkable record. In the last five years, South Carolina has won 167 games and lost only nine games. The team is a powerhouse, and each athlete is important to Staley.

“It’s super fulfilling to know that you could be a part of your players’ lives where they can fulfill imagined dreams and unimagined dreams,” Staley shared in the press conference.

Staley has been open about her faith—both in the “gameday devotionals” she leads with the team and in pre- and postgame interviews. In fact, the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) has sent multiple letters to University of South Carolina President Michael Amiridis to complain about “serious constitutional concerns.”

After a win over Oregon State University, Coach Staley reflected on the terrible loss South Carolina experienced last season. She continued to celebrate the team’s success this season.

In the postgame interview courtside, Staley said, “If you don’t believe in God, there’s something wrong with you, seriously.” She continued, “I’m a believer. I’m a believer, because he makes things, he makes things come true. When you’re at your worst, he’s at his best.”

The most recent letter from the FFRF stated, “Coach Staley continues to violate the Constitution and the rights of players by promoting her personal religious beliefs through the women’s basketball program.”

RELATED: UConn Basketball Star Paige Bueckers: ‘I’m a Living Testimony’ of God’s Power

Controversy continues to surround the successful coach. But, this time, it’s not due to her faith but instead to her comments supporting trans athletes in women’s sports.