Today
peace seems far off, to judge from the failed peace efforts. Who can bring
about peace? The international community? Yes, if it has the courage and
wisdom to take the necessary steps and to impose on both parties a solution
that will guarantee the freedom of the Palestinian people in an independent
and viable State, and security for Israel within internationally recognised
frontiers. On the one side, the Palestinian Authority, which represents most
of the people, is ready to agree a peace that will give them freedom and
their own State. Certain groups, such as Hamas and Jihad, who represent a
minor proportion of the population, believe in peace through violence. The
present Israeli Government has, for three years, chosen war. For three years
the war has made victims on both sides and peace is no further forward.The Order is the first and most fundamental source of the support that enables our diocese of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem to live and fulfil its pastoral obligations. This is what Pope Pius IX, who decided that the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem should return to live in Jerusalem and organise an active diocese there, wanted from the outset. At the same time, he gave him the task of reorganising the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem into an entity that would provide the necessary moral and material support. In fact, Patriarch Joseph Valerga succeeded in reorganising the Order and in obtaining its recognition in the royal courts of the day. Since then, the Order has developed and continues to be an active diocese in Jerusalem and in the three countries (now four) in which the Pope desired that it should be established: Palestine, Israel, Jordan and Cyprus.
The Order’s first objective is to serve the Christian Faith in the Land of the Lord. A service that is both spiritual and missionary, and a life in spiritual solidarity with the Holy Land and the Mystery of the Cross and the Resurrection.
The Patriarchal Diocese carries out its universal service to the Faith, welcoming to its activities all Christians and also non-Christians.