Bishop

The Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL) is The Rt. Rev. Dr. Munib A. Younan. He was consecrated as the third Palestinian bishop of the ELCJHL on 5 January 1998 at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem in the presence of religious and political leaders from many nations.

As the biographical sketch shows, he was educated in Palestine and Finland and has been very active in the Middle East Council of Churches, the Lutheran World Federation and the Fellowship of the Middle East Evangelical Churches (FMEEC).   Bishop Younan made the first translation of the Augsburg Confession into Arabic and was a key initiator of several dialogue initiatives among the three monotheistic religions in Palestine.

At present he is Vice President of the Lutheran World Federation, the President of the FMEEC and president of the Board of Managers of the International Christian Committee (ICC) of Jerusalem, serving with the three patriarchs and nine other bishops of Jerusalem.

The people of the Holy Land are at the heart of the ELCJHL’s educational work. First and foremost, the ELCJHL Schools and Educational Programs are working to educate the next generation of Palestinian citizens and leaders in a spirit of creativity and tolerance. We pursue this goal by offering our students the highest quality educational opportunities in the region in a safe, open, and stimulating environment.

The ELCJHL Schools enroll approximately 2,000 students between the ages of 4 and 18. The schools have always enrolled both boys and girls, both Muslims and Christians. Of our students, approximately 55 percent are boys and 45 percent are girls. Although Palestinian Christians constitute less than 2% of the population in Palestine, 60 percent of the students in the Lutheran schools are Christian and 40 percent are Muslim. Students learn together in an open and peaceful environment and are prepared for lives of dialogue and exchange with all people.

Through student councils, parent councils, teacher committees, and a variety of extra-curricular and outreach programs, we seek to involve deeply the entire school community in the life and mission of the ELCJHL Schools.

Our students come from families with a wide variety of backgrounds. Some have rich histories in their villages going back hundreds and thousands of years; others are political refugees from all over Palestine-Israel living in the UN-administered refugee camps located in the Bethlehem and Ramallah areas.