A Shelter for Adventurers By Fr. Cristobal Vilaroig In 1807 the German explorer Ulrich Jasper Seetzen arrived on the Gennesaret plain. He was accompanied only by a guide named Hussein, and they entered the plain of Gennesaret from the north. Next to the abandoned caravanserai of Beit-Zeide (today Horvat Minnim), the guide told Seetzen that…
My Dear Magdala Family, Time goes by so fast. During these weeks, we have received many pilgrims in the Holy Land, some of them encouraged by our virtual pilgrimages: Welcome to the Holy Land! It is beautiful to meet the faces behind the ‘likes’ we got on our social networks during the pandemic. In May,…
Footsteps By Kathleen Nichols On an early April morning, I quietly slid one of the paddleboards at Magdala onto the glassy surface of the Sea of Galilee for a sunrise prayer over the water. After the sun rose into white heat above the Golan Heights, I turned back toward the Magdala shoreline, using Mt. Arbel…
My Dear Magdala Family, After our arduous journey of Exodus, we finally come to Easter, or, as the catechism used to say, ‘Pascua Florida’ (Feast of the Flowers). Happy Easter to every one of you and your family and friends! Circumstances and time tend to surprise us. Sometimes when we think that more intense periods…
Sunrise Stroll & Chat at the Sea of Galilee with the whole world! By Fr. Eamon Kelly Where do you find atheists, agnostics, Protestants of all kinds, together with Eastern Orthodox Christians, Jews, Muslims, and others strolling and scrolling together with a Catholic priest, resonating together and often offering to pray for each other when…
The Lover’s Tower By Fr. Cristobal Vilaroig Richard Pococke was an Anglican bishop born in the early 18th century. Besides serving his flock, Rev. Pococke found enough time to travel the world. Between 1737 and 1741, he visited Palestine, and when he returned to his native England, he wrote down his experiences in his great Description…
Mary of Magdala was weeping, her master had died, and now his body was no longer on the sepulcher. Suddenly, she saw two angels dressed in white, and they said to her: “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said, “They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him. When she said…
Who Do You Say That I am? This question was posed by Jesus to his apostles in the region of Caesarea Philippi, on or near the feast of Yom Kippur, when the name of the Lord was pronounced by the High Priest in the Temple. He asked his disciples, “who do people say the Son…
Holy By Kathleen Nichols We shivered with cold and anticipation before dawn, gathered around the small rust-colored boat altar on the Magdala shoreline for a sunrise Mass. The crimson outlined clouds brightened as our voices proclaimed, ‘holy, holy, holy Lord!’. (Isaiah 6:3) They professed with us: ‘the Heavens and Earth are full of your glory,…
Antonio Castillo and Magdalo Castle By Fr. Cristobal Vilaroig Spanish pilgrims never stopped visiting the Holy Land. Shortly after the arrival of the Ottomans (1517), some famous Spaniards would visit Jerusalem: the poet Juan de la Encina, who would narrate his pilgrimage in verse (1519); saint Ignatius of Loyola (1523) and the music composer Francisco…
