Jerusalem authorities fear Catholic-Orthodox clashes during Holy Week

Catholic World News

Jerusalem, Mar. 21 (CWNews.com) – Public officials in Jerusalem are
bracing for Eastertide conflicts between Orthodox and Catholic clerics
at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, according to the London Daily
Telegraph .

Local officials have reportedly called in Catholic and Orthodox leaders
for discussions in recent days, hoping to ward off a repetition
of an ugly fight that occurred last September, when Orthodox monks
charged and battered first Franciscan friars, then local police at
the basilica. The Telegraph reports that a videotape of that incident
shows the Greek Orthodox Patriarch Irineos instructing monks “to
close the door of the Franciscan chapel by force.”

Custody of the Church of Holy Sepulcher has been shared among the
Catholic, Orthodox, and Armenian churches for generations, on the
basis of a complex agreement that has been enforced by successive
governments in Jerusalem. Disputes among the monks who administer the
basilica are commonplace, but the arrival of a new Orthodox patriarch
has brought tensions to a new height.

“We had good relations with the Greeks before now,” one Catholic
cleric told the Telegraph. But he said that Patriarch Irineos had
been “a lightning-rod for trouble.” This year, the Orthodox leader
has announced plans for an Easter procession that would pass through
the chapel that is in the custody of the Franciscans.

Franciscans are appealing to the Israeli government for help, saying
that the Orthodox procession should follow the traditional route, not
impinging on the parts of the basilica controlled by Catholics. The
Franciscans’ case is complicated, however, by the Israeli courts’
reluctance to become involved in religious disputes.

The access of Catholic institutions to Israeli secular courts is
one of the key questions being discussed by representatives of the
Holy See and the Israeli government in the negotiations designed
to produce a long-awaited agreement establishing the juridical and
economic rights of Catholic institutions in Israel.