Days 4 & 5: St. Katherine's & the Dead Sea

I feel like I haven't blogged in days!

I wish I could express properly in words the emotions that we experienced over the last two days.

I truly count myself blessed that I was able to venerate the relics of St. Katherine and serve Divine Liturgy at the Holy Monastery on Mt. Sinai dedicated to her.

But, before I go into detail about that, let me describe our journey to get there...

Yesterday morning we departed early from our hotel in Jericho to make the long drive into Egypt. We left at 8 a.m. said our morning prayers, read from the Psalms. The scenery of the mountains and desert made the Psalm readings come alive as we re-lived them.

At about 2:45 we reached the border of Israel and Egypt. We then made our way through Israeli Passport control and customs and walked across the border to Egypt.

Once in Egypt, we boarded a new bus with the goal of making it to St. Katherine's before Vespers that starts at 4 p.m. We barely made it, just catching the end of the Artoklasia service that they celebrating for St. Iakovos.

We then had the amazing blessing of venerating the skull of St. Katherine and her hand. The priest (from England) then gave each pilgrim a ring from the monastery reminding us of the vision St. Katherine had when she was promised to be the bride of Christ.

After the veneration of the relics we wer

e taken into the museum of the monastery and saw so many amazing things, including one of my all time favorite icons, the Christ Pantokrator from Sinai.

Now, the group split up...some wanted to ascend Mt. Horeb to go to the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (an arduous climb that lasted all night) and some wanted to attend early morning Liturgy at St. Katherine's.

I received the blessing to serve, so the choice was easy for me! I had the great joy of co-celebrating Divine Liturgy in one of the oldest monasteries in the world!

Nine of the group ascended the mountain(including our oldest and youngest members: James, 85 and Polydoros, 18), and the rest of the group worshiped at the monastery.

After a quick breakfast, we re-boarded our bus, traveled back to the border and crossed over into Israel again.

We drove for a few hours and just finished our stop at the Dead Sea. Our guide Yani gave more significance to the Dead Sea by explaining that the reason Christ was baptized near the mouth of the Dead Sea was that sin was washed in the Jordan's living waters and taken to the Dead Sea where nothing can live. Our group enjoyed their time in the Dead Sea, floating and even Greek Dancing!