A volcano under the glacier in Iceland threatened to cancel the study and service trip of Lutheran Parish Nurses International to support Christians in Palestine, but God had other plans.

Marcia Schnorr, certified lay minister-parish nurse at St. Paul Lutheran Church, Rochelle, Illinois, was the escort and tour leader for the spring event.

A team of parish nurses and others from across the U.S. were scheduled to fly from Chicago to London where they would change planes and fly on to Tel Aviv. In Tel Aviv two parish nurses and two pastors were scheduled to join them for this international event. Together they would provide support and continuing education for parish nurses bringing the Gospel and desperately needed health programs to Christians in Palestine.

This work has been growing since Schnorr and the LCMS were first invited five years ago by Christmas Lutheran Church in Bethlehem to help them set up critically needed parish nurse ministry.

The volcano eruption resulted in cancellation of the U.S. flight and closing of London's Heathrow Airport for the connecting flight. “We were told it may be three or four days before we could leave,” said Schnorr. “Just 24 hours later the U.S. team was en route to Tel Aviv on a different carrier by a different route. Sadly, the Finnish group never made it out of Finland.”

Still, the team was able to accomplish what had been planned: Rev. Greg Hoffmann (St. Paul, Rochelle) provided pastoral leadership and led the study of Psalm 23 with reflections for parish nurses. The parish nurses hosted a health fair attended by about 100 Palestinian women and gave presentations to a group of young parents. A discussion among parish nurses from the U.S., Palestine and Finland was facilitated via Skype, with a parish nurse in Australia also joining in.

Rev. Mitri Raheb, pastor at Christmas Lutheran Church in Bethlehem, presented banners to Sue Neff (El Cajon, Calif.) for her efforts in raising funds for a van that enables parish nurses to more easily visit villagers, and to Marcia Schnorr for her leadership in developing parish nursing in Bethlehem – and soon into the West Bank.

The Northern Illinois District LCMS Parish Nurse Network continues to “adopt” Raida Mansour, parish nurse in Bethlehem, and bring her to the U.S. for the Concordia Parish Nurse Conference on a biennial basis. An annual silent auction in the district raises funds to help their supportive efforts with Mansour.

Others on this trip from the district in addition to Schnorr and Pastor Hoffmann included Beth Drost (Arlington Heights), Jan Faulkner, (Peace, Lombard), Tina Hoffmann (St. Paul, Rochelle) and Marie Payes (Lutheran Church Charities).

New Lutheran College

Local parish nurses are not the only Lutherans getting involved in support for Christians in Palestine who live under stress and deprivation due to continuing conflicts between Israel and Islamic groups in Palestine. Several from the Northern Illinois District LCMS were part of a team this spring to help establish the Dar-el-Kalima College in Bethlehem.

Dar-el-Kalima, which means House of the Word, is a Christian college – the first Lutheran college – offering two-year associate degrees in the arts, multimedia, communications and tourism related studies to provide job skills and Christian influence for these non-traditional disciplines in the Middle East.

Representatives from five of the Concordia Universities, including Concordia Chicago, traveled to Bethlehem earlier this year to lay the ground work to partner with Dar-el-Kalima College. The college will officially open its doors in November. 

NID participants in the group that went to Bethlehem included John and Donna Walz (St. John, Lombard), Karl and Shirley Kreft (Immanuel, Downers Grove) Alan and Karen Meyer (Trinity, Roselle), Hazel and Rich Bimler (Trinity, Roselle) and Beth Nelson, the vice president for Bright Stars of Bethlehem.