In Bethlehem, Father Piccirillo recognized the incredible value and cultural legacy of our sacred arts. He was familiar with the evolution of mother-of-pearl, olivewood and ceramic art in Bethlehem, and how their unique crafting had been developed through the interactions of pilgrims and locals over centuries. Father Piccirillo committed himself to reigniting the artistic movements that he saw in danger of being left in the rubble of mass production.

With support from the John Paul II Foundation and the Custodia Terræ Sanctæ (Custody of the Holy Land), Father Piccirillo and Father Ibrahim Faltas “founder & chairman of Piccirillo Handicraft Center”, began to offer courses in handicrafts to a small group of interested artists, taught by local masters. In 2008, they invited an Italian coral master from Sardegna, Salvatore Giannottu, and the local  mother-of-pearl master, Salim Ateek, to teach the first course. The first class welcomed over a dozen students, many of whom continue to craft works of art at the Piccirillo Handicraft Center until this day. Unfortunately, Father Piccirillo did not live to see the first class take place. He passed away from cancer shortly before its commencement. However, the seed he lay there would blossom into a renaissance of Bethlehem artists who have since swelled their artforms to new heights.

After some time of successfully offering handicraft courses, Father Ibrahim, who had continued to head the project after Father Piccirillo’s passing, began to see that it was not enough to teach local people the art, but that there also needed to be meaningful opportunities for them to use their newfound craft. The “Custodia Cross” was the item that transformed our small community-based project into a vibrant and thriving social business. During a visit to our center, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Pierbattista Pizzaballa, spotted a small mother-of-pearl cross that one of our students had created. He was captivated by its beauty and symbolism and, to our surprise, he asked us if we could make a large amount to offer to pilgrims visiting the Custody in Jerusalem. We spoke to our students, and they agreed to take on the challenge. The first order was fulfilled, and with it, began a new era of production for the Piccirillo Handicraft Center, bringing us ever closer to our goal of providing sustainable income-generating opportunities to our community.

At that time, the Piccirillo Center was open only during course instruction or production. Father Ibrahim felt strongly that the Center should provide more to the community than production work and arts courses, and he advocated to open the space as a community center in order to create more jobs and better serve the local community. The center began to work with vulnerable communities, providing meaningful work to people with disabilities, and others who benefitted from the center’s expansion. 

Today, the Piccirillo Handicraft Center employs many artisans and collaborates with local workshops to create and sell authentic Bethlehem handicrafts all over the world. As our reputation grows locally and internationally, so does our commitment to our founding motto, “With and for the people.”