“There have always been some small difficulties in the relationships between such different worlds. Every time there is some discomfort in the city or in the country, it is also reflected in the attitudes of the students and the teachers. We can call them small tremors. But what happened on Oct. 7 [of last year] was a real earthquake that shook the balance that has been created in almost 30 years of school.”
After the first week of the war, during which the school was closed, Pari wrote to his teachers.
“I invited them to create an atmosphere of serenity for the children, who had never felt their lives and their future so threatened as in that moment,” he recalled. “I asked them not to talk about the war but to make the music lessons a moment of normality and beauty. And so it was.”
The school has reopened its doors to everyone and gradually has started to fill up again. In these months, it has also become a social cushion, a refuge for the children who often experience a poisoned atmosphere of war and are burdened by serious economic difficulties at home, with significant repercussions on them. But whoever enters here leaves the heavy baggage of war outside for a few hours.
Friday Orchestra
The so-called “Friday Orchestra” at the school is made up of Arab female students ages 18–20; the conductor is an Israeli Jew.
“When the school reopened,” Pari recounted, “the students expressed their discomfort in meeting him: In their eyes, he represented the enemy who was killing their people in Gaza. The conductor started the lesson by saying, ‘I know you see me as the Israeli Jew, but I don’t see in you the ones who committed the massacre on Oct. 7. In this class, we try to create a better future where we can live together and do something beautiful.’ Since then, lessons never stopped.”
Pari is also a musician, having graduated in transverse flute. He played in an orchestra and taught in schools.
“Music has always played an important role in my life,” he said. “When I became a friar, I thought I would have to leave it behind. However, when I arrived here, I discovered that music is also central here — in the Holy Land, singing is fundamental in all liturgies. I consider it a gift that the Lord has given me. I thought I would have to give up music, but instead, in a different way, it is still at the heart of my service.”
In addition to being a musician and the director of the Magnificat Institute, Pari is also responsible for the Custody of the Holy Land for Interreligious Dialogue — a meaningful coincidence.
(Story continues below)
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“Although the Magnificat Institute was not born with this purpose, it has gradually developed as a space for interreligious dialogue,” he explained. “There are no specific programs or projects, but in fact, this dialogue occurs spontaneously through interaction. In our classes, small but significant miracles happen that wouldn’t be possible without Magnificat.”
One of the most striking stories is that of Emma Spitkovsky and her student Mohammad Al-Shaikh. Spitkovsky, a piano teacher of Ukrainian Jewish origin, chose to become a teacher at Magnificat, fully embracing its spirit. “It is here,” Pari recounted, “that she first encountered a Muslim, a Palestinian boy who became her best student. To make music, both had to break down their prejudices.”
Mohammed graduated from the institute two years ago. To attend classes, he would travel from Ramallah (in the Palestinian territories) to Jerusalem two or three times a week, sometimes waiting for hours at the checkpoint. In June 2023, he was the one who animated a musical evening in Jerusalem, a contribution from the local Church to the event “World Meeting on Human Fraternity, Not Alone” held in Vatican City.
On that occasion his teacher recounted: “When I met Mohammad, he was 10 years old: I immediately recognized his extraordinary talent. I am proud to have been his teacher. Despite our different faiths, our different cultures, what we can do together is not only possible but, above all, beautiful.”
Then there’s Musa, a young Muslim from Bethlehem who plays the clarinet. His teacher is a religious Jew from Jerusalem. Musa never received permission to travel to Jerusalem for lessons at Magnificat. “We found a Lutheran church located in a kind of ‘no man’s land’ that both could access,” Pari recounted. “Here, Musa and his teacher met for almost two years for their lessons.”
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