Rev. Dr. Naim Ateek was our Preacher on April 22, 2018

Rev. Dr. Naim Stifan Ateek (Arabic: نعيم عتيق‎, translit. Na`īm `Ateeq) was born in 1937 in the Palestinian village of Bisan, south of the Sea of Galilee.  He and his family, along with the entire village were forced out of Bisan when the Israeli troops occupied Bisan in 1948.  The family went to live in Nazareth.  In 1967 he was ordained in the Episcopal Church. In 1991, Reverend Ateek co-founded Sabeel, the Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem.  Previous to that, he served as Canon of St. George’s Cathedral in Jerusalem and as parish priest in Haifa and Nazareth.  He has been an active leader in the shaping of the Palestinian liberation theology. He was the first to articulate a Palestinian theology of liberation in his book, Justice, and only Justice, a Palestinian Theology of Liberation, published by Orbis in 1989, and based on his dissertation for his degree in theology. The book laid the foundation of a theology that addresses the conflict over Palestine and explores the political as well as the religious, biblical, and theological dimensions. A former Canon of St. George's Cathedral, Jerusalem, he lectures widely both at home and abroad.

Rev. Dr. Naim Ateek was recently in Vancouver as part of a countrywide speaking tour and the launch of his latest book, A Palestinian Theology of Liberation: The Bible, Justice, and the Palestine–Israel Conflict. We were delighted and honoured to have Dr. Ateek as our preacher at St. Francis-in-the-Wood on Sunday, April 22, 2018.  You can hear his sermon by clicking on the sound file below.