GreenGreen
Samer Isaac, 14 (left), drops olives into a bucket held by Tareq Al’raj, 14. The two youth volunteer through a Lutheran environmental education center to help farmers with their olive harvests.
is a color for hope
Lutheran center grows environmental awareness among Palestinians Text by Judith Sudilovsky / Photos by Debbie Hill
Sudilovsky is a freelance journalist based in Jerusalem. 32 The Lutheran •
www.thelutheran.org
Shaden Abu Alzulf, 14 (left), and Amira Ishaq, 14, help with the environmental center’s cleanup campaign, picking up garbage on the campus of Talitha Kumi Lutheran School in Beit Jala.
R
iad Abu Saadah holds a small yellow- green bird in his hand. Sitting in a circle around him, schoolchildren from around Beit Jala, Palestine, crane their necks to see it. A bird is never just a bird; “there is a name for every bird,” he said, gently cradling the green finch. “This is a sifri.”
The children have come to the Evangelical Lutheran Church Environmental Education Center in Beit Jala to learn about Palestinian natural heritage. Situated on the rolling green hills of the Talitha Kumi Lutheran School, the center is an oasis of green. Its pine trees and local plants are a welcome respite from what most of the children encounter daily—
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