The seventy-sixth I

سير ذاتية ومذكّرات

The seventy-sixth I

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It remains to be said that that what annoys the Patriarch most is the light manner in which the Lebanese, and mostly the Maronites, deal with Lebanon as if it were a priori never threatened by annihilation no matter how great the risk, or how much devastation they inflict on it. It annoys him to see them forget that Lebanon is the fruit of a centuries-long struggle, in which sweat mixed with blood on many occasions. It hurts him to see that the Maronites today do not know that their fathers longed to see what their eyes see today. The 76th Patriarch, Mar Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir, knows that only four of his predecessors knew Lebanon: those were Patriarchs Khoreish, Meouchi, Arida, and Hoyeck. On the other hand, 71 patriarchs saw Lebanon through the eyes of faith, and greeted it from afar just as Moses saw the Promised Land from the mountaintop of Nabu without being able to enter it. The Maronite patriarchs always dreamed of a homeland in which they could live free and equal. This homeland was realized at the beginning of the last century, but as soon as two generations passed, it entered the danger zone.