Brecon & Bethlehem : Christmas Morning 2008 : Brecon Cathedral
Motorists coming from the capital city to the largest town in a British National Park, i.e. driving northwards from Cardiff to Brecon, will take about an hour using the A470 – under the M4, up the Taff Vale, bypassing Pontypridd and Abercynon; then up past Aberfan and Merthyr Tydfil, you are suddenly in a beautiful landscape – you pass three reservoirs as you cross the border between Merthyr and Powys climbing to the top of the Beacons at the Storey Arms; then downhill along the River Tarrell to the River Usk. A mile short of the town of less than 8000 you cross the A40; at the roundabout is a large bilingual sign explaining that here is Brecon (named after a medieval saint) or Aberhonddu (marking the place where the smaller Honddu joins the bigger Usk). The Mayor of Brecon is a wonderful symbol: Martin Weale, the Vicar’s Warden at Llanfaes, an independent financial adviser, has almost no power at all; but he is a sign of continuity; his predecessors extend back to Philip Havard in 1556 and before there was a Mayor there were Bailiffs. Down the years the boundaries of Brecon have changed and its powers first grew and then reduced, but I dare say every generation of local government has put up its own signposts. Today the main goal of the driver may be the military or county museum, or the leisure centre, or the canal basin, or the barracks, or the shops or even this Cathedral. Here, you may learn, was born Sarah Siddons, the actress, in 1755. Above a community going back at least to a Roman settlement in AD 80 and probably much more than 2000 years ago with a couple of Iron Age forts, there is this much rebuilt church begun by Norman invaders in 1093.
Let me start again: Motorists going from the capital city of Israel/Palestine to the largest Christian town in the West Bank, i.e. driving southwards from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, will take only about 20 minutes using the Hebron Highway – passing through residential and then industrial suburbs of the capital, you are suddenly in a beautiful landscape – dry hilly country on the edge of the Judean desert. On the right is Gilo, a large and growing illegal Israeli settlement; on a rise to the left is an ancient Greek Orthodox monastery dedicated to the prophet Elijah – you are out of Israel into Palestine, via a time-consuming border crossing. Beyond the hill the road descends and a biblical panorama unfolds – there are small olive groves and fields where sheep and goats graze, tended by shepherds in long dark robes; and further below – an Arab Christian and Muslim town – lots of church towers, mosque minarets, TV aerials and solar heating panels. The view is much spoiled by an enormous grey concrete prison wall with watch-towers – the so-called Israeli separation wall, allowing the 60,000 inhabitants of the town just two gates to the outside world. You pass a trilingual sign explaining that here is Bethlehem or in Hebrew Beth-Lehem (house of bread) or in Arabic Bayt-Lahm (house of meat). Somehow the Christmas card ideas have to be thrown out of the coach or taxi window – even Bethlehem has legally defined limits. It seems almost improper that it should be a municipality, with an Arab Mayor, a Jewish military governor with nuclear weapons at his disposal and a Palestinian army chief who doesn’t even have a helmet or bullet-proof vest. But come to think of it the Mayor of Bethlehem is a wonderful symbol: Victor Batarseh, a Roman Catholic, a retired physician, a former activist in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, has very little power; but he is a sign of continuity; his predecessors extend back 2000 years before the birth of Christ into the days of the Old Testament – back to the days of King David, who was also born here; back to the days of David’s great-grandmother, Ruth, whose family farmed here. Bethlehem has had lots of invaders down the centuries – Romans, Persians, Arabs, Crusaders, Saracens, Turks, even the British and now the Israelis and the emerging Palestinian State. I dare say every generation of local government has put up its own signposts. Today the main goal of the driver will almost certainly be Manger Square and its Church of the Nativity - a much rebuilt church begun by Constantine in 330 – built over the place where Jesus Christ was born.
All the other early churches in the Holy Land were destroyed by the Persians in 614, but they spared Bethlehem because they thought they recognised three of their own fellow countrymen in a picture of the Wise Men over the entrance. From the outside the structure looks more like a citadel than a church (you know another cathedral like that) – even the traditional tall arched doors are missing (or rather they are filled in) – there is just a single small opening, perhaps four feet high, appropriately called “The Gate of Humility”; actually it was built not for humility but to prevent infidels storming into church on horse or camelback. Near the main altar pilgrims bow their heads a second time to descend an ancient staircase into what must have been the cave stable underneath the famous Bethlehem inn. Even today some Bethlehem houses are built on top of natural caves which are still used for stabling animals. Then you have to bend low a third time to get into the rocky hollow of the manger – the lowest part of the cave, where the fodder would naturally collect. It’s a sort of parable – you can’t see the place where Jesus Christ was born without three times bending low – without three times making an act of humility – as if the very walls of the place are crying out: “You’ve got to stoop here, friend, for this is the place where God stooped so low for you.”