October 19th, 2025
Two years ago today, over the ashen sky of Gaza, the heavens bore witness to unspeakable sorrow. Smoke veiled the moon. Fire consumed the air. And beneath that burning sky, one of the world’s oldest sanctuaries fell victim to a crime of war. The Church of Saint Porphyrios—where candles had glowed through centuries of conquest, empire, and prayer—was struck by an airstrike. In that moment, sanctuary became ruin, and the faithful who sought refuge within met death in the very place they believed they would be spared.
That night of October 19, 2023, remains an open wound in the conscience of humanity. Inside the church compound, more than five hundred souls—Christians and Muslims alike—huddled together, seeking the one thing war rarely grants: safety. Then came the explosion. Walls groaned, stone gave way, and the upper floor collapsed. Eighteen lives ended beside centuries-old stones that had survived every empire until that night. Twenty more were wounded. The survivors clawed through dust and debris, calling out the names of their children. Their cries mingled with the crackle of fire and the shattering of glass.
The Church of Saint Porphyrios stood for more than bricks and mortar. It was Gaza’s beating heart of faith—a place of refuge, of compassion, of coexistence. Within its walls, Christians and Muslims had knelt side by side, bound not by creed but by suffering and hope. Its fall was not only the destruction of stone; it was the wounding of memory itself.
Even after that night, the church would suffer again. In the summer of 2024, another missile struck its hall but failed to detonate. It was called a miracle—but a miracle should not be needed to keep a house of God from destruction.
The devastation that consumed Saint Porphyrios mirrors what has befallen Gaza as a whole. Mosques, churches, schools, libraries—obliterated. Entire neighborhoods flattened. The Great Omari Mosque, Al-Qissariya Market, and ancient palaces that once told Gaza’s story now lie buried beneath rubble. Museums and archives—the very vessels of collective memory—have been looted or erased. What the world witnesses is more than warfare; it is cultural annihilation, the systematic erasure of heritage, history, and identity.
And yet, amid this darkness, the smallest light endures: the Christian community of Gaza, fragile yet unextinguished.
For two thousand years, Gaza’s Christians have been the living witnesses of the earliest faith. Their roots trace back to the age of the Apostles themselves—when Saint Porphyrios, a bishop from Thessaloniki, walked these same streets and built a church upon ancient ground. Through Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, and modern wars, the Christians of Gaza remained—tending the poor, teaching the young, and standing as bridges of peace in a land forever torn.
They are not strangers to the Holy Land; they are its children. Their existence is the living memory of Christianity’s birthplace. To lose them would be to sever Christianity from its origins. Every candle lit in Gaza’s churches connects directly to Bethlehem, to Jerusalem, to Calvary. Every Gospel read in their tongue carries the echo of the first believers who broke bread on this soil.
Their survival is not a matter of demographics—it is a matter of spiritual continuity. Without them, the story of Christianity becomes a tale recited, not a life lived. Their faith, passed hand to hand, mother to child, monk to pilgrim, has kept the flame of Christ alive in one of the harshest corners of the world. And now that flame flickers, buffeted by war and exile.
This is why the Christians of the West—and indeed of the entire world—cannot turn away. To forget Gaza’s Christians is to betray the Gospel they guard. To remain silent while their sanctuaries crumble is to deny our shared faith in the Incarnation that made the dust of this land holy.
Every Christian in comfort owes a duty to those in peril. Advocacy is not charity, it is fidelity. When one part of the Body of Christ suffers, the whole body suffers. If the Church in Gaza disappears, a part of our collective soul vanishes with it.
The Christians of Gaza stand as peacemakers amid chaos, their endurance a rebuke to despair. They minister to the wounded, feed the hungry, and shelter the displaced. Their very presence proclaims the truth that light shines even in darkness, and that mercy endures when everything else is lost. To defend them is not only a moral obligation—it is an act of preserving Christianity itself.
Now, in October 2025, a fragile ceasefire holds. The bombs have quieted, but silence does not mean peace. Everyone in Gaza is utterly overwhelmed. There is no internet access; all communication cables have been destroyed, and entire networks lie silent. Cellular towers have been reduced to rubble, severing families from one another and leaving communities isolated in despair.
Every person we have spoken to (when internet is available) has lost their home, or their home stands so badly damaged that it is no longer safe to live in. Walls still standing are cracked and hollow, haunted by silence. There are no materials or equipment to rebuild, no furniture to reclaim the sense of home that once was. No dwelling in Gaza today can truly be called habitable. Many cannot even be reached—buried beneath mountains of rubble and debris. The path to recovery will not take months, but years. Yet amidst the ruins, the people endure, clinging to faith, to hope, and to the faint promise that the world will not turn away.
Everyone who survived is doing “okay”, and the buildings will be rebuilt slowly. Over the past few days, many homes, buildings, and institutions were completely destroyed—but thank God, the people are alive. Some of the refugees from the church have started returning to check on their own homes and those of relatives who escaped Gaza, to see if they are still habitable. Rent has reached astronomical levels—prices are even higher, in some cases double, compared to rent in Europe. Thankfully, some fruits and vegetables have begun entering Gaza again, and prices are slowly decreasing compared to before. For example, tomatoes that once cost 1,000 shekels per kilo now cost about 200 shekels—one-fifth of the previous price. Every day, prices are dropping little by little. We hope for lasting peace, and may the dead rest in peace. Everything will be rebuilt step by step.
They are also saying that batteries and gas for solar power are slowly being allowed to enter Gaza again. Propane has begun reaching the southern regions, and many pray it will soon reach the north, where families still cook with synthetic diesel—a harsh substitute that burns the food and fills the air with toxic fumes. Life remains difficult, but there is a whisper of recovery, a fragile sign that hope is not entirely lost.
Aid convoys now inch through broken roads under the terms of the ceasefire. The United Nations estimates that 560 tons of food enter Gaza daily—still far too little for a population in ruin. Most hospitals remain only partially functional. Families cook what they can over open flames. Propane is scarce, batteries rarer still. Yet somehow, in every home that can still stand, an icon remains upright, a candle is lit, and prayers rise into the smoke-filled air.
This fragile quiet must not be squandered. It must become the soil of healing. The world must not call it peace while people starve, nor call it justice while the guilty are unrepentant. A true ceasefire is not the absence of bullets—it is the beginning of accountability, of protection, of rebuilding trust.
We, the Order of Saint George the Great Martyr, pledge our voices and our lives to this cause. We remember the eighteen who died at Saint Porphyrios and the countless others lost across Gaza. We refuse the amnesia of convenience. We commit to defending what remains holy, to rebuilding what has been broken, to supporting those who have borne the unbearable.
To the faithful of Gaza: though your churches stand in ruin, your faith remains radiant. The walls may fall, but Christ still dwells among you. You have walked through fire and have not been consumed. Your courage is our lesson, your endurance, our rebuke. Though your night is long, dawn has already begun to gather at the edges of your sky.
To Christians across the world: do not avert your eyes. Do not pray from afar while forgetting your brethren at the Cross’s root. Speak, write, give, go—make their cry your own. Gaza’s Christians are not a relic to be mourned—they are the living Gospel, suffering still upon Golgotha’s hill.
To those who make war: remember that the Holy Land is not yours to scorch. Its stones are older than your armies; its sanctuaries holier than your flags. Every church bombed, every mosque defiled, every child killed, rends the fabric of creation itself.
Let this ceasefire not be a pause between wars, but a turning point in conscience. Let it not become a silence of forgetting, but a silence where compassion speaks louder than vengeance. Let rebuilding begin not only of walls, but of hearts.
In sorrow and hope, we announce a memorial service to be held for the dead of Saint Porphyrios and all who perished across Gaza, today (October 19, 2025), at Saint Nicholas Antiochian Orthodox Cathedral, 355 State Street, Brooklyn, NY. The service will stand as a sign: their names live; their memory endures; our duty remains.
And in their honor, we call upon all people of faith and goodwill to join the Order of Saint George the Great Martyr in aiding the living and rebuilding what war has tried to erase. The Church of Saint Porphyrios must rise again—not only as stone and mortar, but as symbol, testimony, and hope.
Your generosity can bring light where bombs brought ruin. Contributions to the Order’s Gaza Relief and Restoration Fund will go directly toward:
Restoring the Church of Saint Porphyrios, including repairs to its sanctuary, icons, and structural foundations;
Providing humanitarian aid—food, medicine, and shelter—for Christian families displaced by war;
Supporting clergy and faithful who continue to minister amid devastation.
Every donation, every prayer, every act of solidarity helps keep faith alive where the world once turned its face away.
May Saint George, the fearless champion of truth, intercede for Gaza. May he guard the innocent, strengthen the weary, and awaken the powerful to repentance. May the spirit of peace—so long crucified—finally find resurrection among the ruins.
For as long as the stones of Saint Porphyrios stand, even broken, they will speak. As long as we remember, love has not abandoned the world. And from these ashes, we vow: we will remember, we will rebuild, and we will not be silenced.
In mourning, in solidarity, and in unyielding hope—
The Holy Orthodox Order of Saint George the Great Martyr
The Order remains steadfast in its commitment to the community of Saint Porphyrios, to Archbishop Alexios of Tiberias, to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, and to all Christians who live and breathe across Gaza, the Holy Land, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, and the wider Middle East.
To make a charitable contribution to the Order and its efforts in the Holy Land and Middle East, please use the yellow [Donate button] in the top menu. If you are interested in joining the Order as a member, please click on the menu item entitled “Join the Order.”
