Day 2: Church of the Apostles, Mount of Beatitudes, Primacy of Peter, Multiplication Site, Kabutz, Sea of Galilee

We have had a very busy Tuesday morning so far.

We started out by going to the Church of the Holy Apostles in Tiberias (right down the road from our hotel). There we met Fr. Timotheos, prayed together and enjoyed the serenity of the site.

In the Church there are three altars, one dedicated to Sts. Peter and Paul, one to the Holy Apostles, and one to St. Mary Magdalene. We sang hymns to each of them.

After that we moved on to Mount of Beatitudes. This a Roman Catholic site and is beautifully maintained. We read the Beatitudes in Greek and English and meditated on the powerful words of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ.

We then departed to the Catholic church of the Primacy of Peter and the site of Multiplication of the loaves and fish. Where over 5,ooo men (and also women and children) were fed from only 5 loaves and two fish.

It was at this site that we bumped into a group led by Fr. Justinian from Romania. It was a blessing to see fellow Orthodox Christians.

At the site of the multiplication, we ventured to the shore of the Sea of Galilee where a few brave souls walked into the shallow part of the waters. We also saw one of the seven springs.

We read and reflected on the multiplication and what this means to us in our lives, and how Christ can multiply the many gifts that we have been blessed with.

After this, we stopped at a traditional kibutz, then boarded a boat on the Sea of Galilee. The crew raised the American and Greek flags accompanied by the National Anthems and we moved into the middle of the body of water.

There we read the Gospel passage where Christ calmed the storm and walked on the water and discussed how Peter was able to walk on the water when his focus was on Christ. As soon as Peter was the distracted by the storm and took his focus off of Christ, he started to sink. The same can be said for us and our lives. Our focus needs to be on Christ or else we will sink in the storms of troubles that we face. The good news is if we start to sink, we just need to look for Christ's hand reaching out to us.

Finally, before lunch, we stopped and saw the ruins of the village of Magdala, which made me think of my middle daughter, Magda who is named after St. Mary Magdalene. It was amazing to see a small portion of the village of St. Mary Magdalene's birth. Yani was quick to remind us that while this is commonly overlooked site, it is a place that Christ Himself visited.

Ok...whew...now it's time for lunch! Just wanted to jot some of these things down while they were fresh in memory!!

I will update the blog again after our journey to the Jordan River. I also will add photos later.