In his well-loved Christmas carol O Little Town of Bethlehem, written almost 140 years ago in 1868, Bishop Phillips Brooks of Massachusetts was drawing on the experiences of the American Civil War.
He had seen his land divided and his nation go to war over slavery and he believed that in taking a clear stand on justice and civil liberties he was reaffirming the very values that are at the heart of the Christmas message. In the midst of conflict and darkness, he could still hold out for the hope brought into the dark streets of the world by the "everlasting Light", for in Bethlehem, he believed, "the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight".
But Bethlehem tonight is a city filled more with fear than with hope. The so-called security wall being built by Israel separates Israelis and Palestinians, Jews, Christians and Muslims, so coldly and so rigidly that it would be impossible for a present-day Mary and Joseph to make the journey this night from Nazareth in northern Israel to Bethlehem in the West Bank. Any shepherds on the hillsides above Bethlehem this Christmas Night would find their pathway to the stable strewn with roadblocks and checkpoints, making their journey pointless.
In her telling documentary last week in RTÉ's Would You Believe series, Felicity Heathcote, who spent several years in Jerusalem, returned to the West Bank and heard the sad plight of ordinary people living with humiliating restrictions on their rights and movements. She listened as Israelis and Palestinians spoke of the wall being less about security and more about what they described as a "land-grab". They were not extremists, for they included former Chief Rabbi of Ireland, Dr David Rosen.
While Israeli settlements and industries continue to spread on the West Bank, parents and children are denied access to a hospital in the heart of Bethlehem, and farmers are cut off from their fields, are denied access to water, see their grapes wither on the vines, and watch helplessly as olive trees that are centuries old are uprooted and cut down. In his hymn, Bishop Brooks wrote: "How silently, how silently,/the wondrous gift is given!" And in her documentary, Ms Heathcote wondered why the world remains so silent about the predicament of these people.
Seven years after his death, Phillips Brooks House in Harvard Yard was dedicated to "the ideal of piety, charity, and hospitality". These ideals are at the heart of the Christmas message. They were needed by an America, deeply divided by Civil War and racism, for its recovery and regeneration. If heeded by Israelis and Palestinians today, they could offer hope to the little town of Bethlehem. And they remain a challenge to us all this Christmas. For in the words of that carol: "Where children pure and happy/pray to the blessed Child,/where misery cries out to thee,/Son of the Mother mild;/where charity stands watching/and faith holds wide the door,/the dark night wakes, the glory breaks,/and Christmas comes once more."