Learning to Believe Ariel Johnston

Evaluate a significant experience....

It was the first night that I had seen the Western Wall, and all of the magic of that moment overcame me like an ocean wave, strong and powerful. As I walked towards the wall, holding hands with the other girls on my semester program, I began to cry. It was such an amazing and powerful site, and the beauty and history of the wall were spellbinding. As we worked our way to the wall and placed our hands upon it, tears began to stream down my face. I had no idea at the time why I was crying, but I knew that my journey in the next 4.5 months would hold the answer.

After that first encounter, I began a personal quest to find what I believed in. I had spent my whole life following a religion, and I wasn’t even sure what I believed in. As the days and weeks went on, the reality of Israel became our life. Daily bombings and terror attacks became a depressing but very real element of our daily existence. One evening in mid March we ventured to Jerusalem, just a few miles from our Kibbutz, to hear the Minister of Tourism speak. My class contested the evening’s events, as we had a large Jewish History test the following morning and needed to stay home and study, but our counselors insisted that we had...