But We Loved Them,A family in the Christian clergy, a devoted parish, and years of searching and doubt culminated in one auspicious moment of encounter with a passing Jew. Since that day twenty-five years ago, Rabbi Yehuda Peretz, senior Arachim lecturer and Judaica scribe, has not only joined the Jewish nation himself, but has brought his entire family and hundreds of Veracruz Bible-study parish members along.
From his home in the central Israeli town of Chashmonaim Rabbi Yehuda Peretz ben Avraham Avinu unravels his tale — how as the son of a pastor and an emerging clergyman himself (the Church of La Divina Providencia) in Veracruz Mexico he embarked on a spiritual odyssey that brought him to Eretz Yisrael with his entire family and congregation in tow.
“We had a parish of devout gentiles well versed in the Bible” begins Reb Yehuda a senior lecturer for Arachim and Hidabroot. “Actually my father was originally an aviation mechanic but he was always looking for spirituality and that drew him to the clergy. When we were growing up he always wanted us to worship G-d. We started out as Catholics but my father moved from denomination to denomination. Adventist Mormon variant Protestant sects … we went through them all.
“Finally he found a sect that sympathized with the Jewish people and he led this congregation in intense Bible study. Whenever we heard of some tragic circumstances befalling the Jews we would gather to recite Psalms in Spanish and pray for a peaceful outcome. Thus during the Six Day War large groups of our parish went to the Israeli consulate in Mexico. But the consulate didn’t know how to relate to these people who looked like Indians and wished to volunteer in Israel.”
As much as the congregation loved Jews however they also pitied them for their “blindness” in not accepting the Christian messiah.
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