Why Israel Has Become the World’s Moral Battleground

Walk through Europe today and you see magnificent churches — soaring ceilings, stained glass, stone that has endured for centuries. You visit great synagogues too, some restored, some preserved as heritage sites.

But many of Europe’s synagogues are empty.

Not because Jews simply drifted away.

But because of the original genocide.

Entire Jewish communities — centuries old — were extinguished. In Kraków, Vilna, Salonika, Berlin, Budapest, synagogues that once pulsed with life now stand as monuments to absence.

And it was not only Europe.

Across much of the Muslim world — Iraq, Egypt, Yemen, Libya, Syria — ancient Jewish communities that predated Islam itself have almost entirely disappeared. Some fled persecution, some were expelled, some left under mounting pressure. In many cities, the synagogues remain. The Jews do not.

The buildings stand. The communities are gone.

That history matters when words like genocide are used lightly today.

Why We Build Houses of Worship

Houses of worship were never only about prayer.

They were about community, purpose, hierarchy, and shared meaning. They told people who they were, where they belonged, and what stood above them.

Even those who doubted belief still belonged to something larger than themselves.

Parashat Terumah speaks directly to this human need.

The Israelites have left Egypt. They have stood at Sinai. Revelation has occurred. And yet God does not say, “Now carry this privately.”

“Ve’asu li Mikdash, v’shachanti b’tocham.” Make for Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.

Not spirituality without form. Not belief without structure. But a shared space — detailed, measured, beautiful.

Gold, silver, fabric, artistry. Order and discipline.

If God is everywhere, why architecture?

Because human beings are not.

We need visible centres to anchor invisible truths. We need shared space to sustain purpose. We need structure to prevent meaning from dissolving into preference.

The Mishkan was not built because God needs gold. It was built because people need order.

The Post-Church World and the Search for Mission

As churches and synagogues weaken across much of the modern West, the human need they once served has not disappeared.

People still long for:

A cause larger than themselves

But when covenantal frameworks decline, those longings attach elsewhere.

Politics becomes theology. Activism becomes liturgy. Movements replace meaning.

And........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)