''This Is Simply Our Home''

In recent years, around 60-100 Syriac Orthodox families have returned from central Europe to Turkey. Encouraged by changes in the political atmosphere, the minority nonetheless faces a host of problems, from the expropriation of land belonging to a monastery, to a ban on special schools and kindergartens, and also a lack of places of worship in Istanbul.

A sign in Aramaic at the side of the road defiantly bids visitors "Welcome to Kafro" next to the official Turkish sign on which the village is called "Elbeğendi". Here, some 15 kilometres south of Midyat, live 17 Syriac Orthodox families. There are no shops in the village, but there is a café that allegedly serves the only decent pizza in the area.

 

"German is the lingua franca amongst the children in the village," says the pizza maker in flawless German, which he learned while living close to Stuttgart. All of the families here have returned to Kafro after living in Germany and Switzerland, some of them for decades.

 

Among them is also the muhtar, the elected village chief, Aziz Demir, who lived with his family in Zurich and near St. Gallen. "Even if our lives there as Christians were very pleasant, something was still missing," he says on the terrace of his house, where he lives with his wife, from a neighbouring village, and their youngest son, Josef, who attends secondary school in Midyat. With a sweeping gesture beyond the newly landscaped garden out onto the plain, he says "This is simply our home."



 

Urgent need of restoration

The Demirs and the other 16 families all live in new houses, because the buildings of the old village, within site of the new developments, were for the most part destroyed in the clashes between the army and the PKK. As was the old church, which is in urgent need of restoration but still awaits the necessary permits.

 

Land dispute with the Turkish government and Kurdish village leaders: The Mor Gabrial is the oldest surviving Christian monastery in the world. There have been claims that the monastery was built on the grounds of a previous mosque - regardless of the fact that the monastery was founded over 170 tears prior to the birth of Mohammed The inhabitants of Kafro have therefore erected a small chapel with the help of the "Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg", as the sign next to the entrance indicates. Services only take place here once in a month, however, as the village does not have its own priest. From the roof of the old church, Demir points out the surrounding villages from east to west: "One is Christian, one Arabic, one Kurdish, one Yazidi and then another one Christian: Enhil (in Turkish Yemişli), where Tuma Çelik comes from."

 

Çelik already moved with his family to Istanbul as a ten-year old, in 1974, and then emigrated to Switzerland in 1985. There, he became an activist fighting for the interests of the Syriac Orthodox church. He wrote for Aramaic magazines and was one of the founders of "Suroyo TV", which broadcasts in Aramaic from Sweden. He has been living again mostly in Tur Abdin since 2010.



 

Legal proceedings against Mor Gabriel

Last summer, he founded the first Turkish-Aramaic monthly magazine, Sabro (Hope), which is published by volunteers in Midyat. Also last summer, he launched a website called "We have grown up in this world together", devoted primarily to the legal proceedings against the region's oldest monastery, Mor Gabriel.

 

The Syriac Orthodox Church claims to derive its origin from one of the first Christian communities. It uses Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic spoken by Jesus Christ and his Apostles, as its official and liturgical language. Pictured: Altar in the Curch of Kafro Mor Gabriel was founded in 397. 1,611 years later, a complaint was filed by the surrounding villages alleging that the monastery was illegally occupying land, some of it even located inside the monastery walls and for which the monastery has paid property taxes regularly since 1937. Nevertheless, the courts have been handing down decisions against the monastery since 2008 and have granted around 28 hectares of its land to the Turkish forest ministry; the last judgement was passed in July 2012.

 

Now the only hope is to take the case before the European Court of Human Rights. Erol Dora, the first Syriac Orthodox member of the Turkish parliament, who was elected for the Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) in Mardin in 2011 and previously worked as a lawyer for minority foundations, commented: "We as the BDP and as the Assyrian people will do all we can to support the monastery at the international level, because we believe that in this trial we have justice on our side."

 

Just one of many problems

For Çelik, however, Mor Gabriel is but one problem among many: "This is just a small drop in the ocean. Assyrians lived mainly in rural areas, where the land registry system was the least active. That's why so many churches, monasteries and community buildings are not even registered."

 

In Switzerland, he became an activist fighting for the interests of the Syriac Orthodox church: Tuma Çelik Today, the great majority of the Syriac Orthodox faithful lives in Istanbul. Sait Susin, chairman of the Syriac Orthodox Foundation in Istanbul, estimates that about 17,000 of the approximately 20,000 members live in Istanbul. Currently, there is only a single Syriac Orthodox church there, in the trendy district of Beyoglu, which was built in 1844 for the around 40-50 families living in the city at that time. The community, most of whose members now live in Bakirköy, close to Atatürk Airport, therefore also uses Catholic churches for services.

 

In addition, the foundation has been submitting applications for years to build a new church, for which it needs land to be assigned to it by the municipal administration. Last year, the city made two "immoral offers" of land confiscated from Catholic and Greek Orthodox communities. The Syriac Orthodox leaders therefore rejected the offers for the time being. Should the plot in question be returned to the Catholic Church, however, they would be prepared to try to reach an agreement with the Catholic priests to erect a new church next to the Catholic cemetery.

 

"You are not a minority"

But that is not the only problem confronting the Istanbul community. Outside of Tur Abdin, only a minority of its members are fluent in Aramaic. Çelik estimates that "around 3,000 people in Istanbul speak the language, but only about 200 can also read and write it." The foundation had therefore submitted a request to open a kindergarten with instruction in Aramaic. The response of the ministry of education was: "You are not a minority; therefore you cannot teach your children a foreign language."

 

Although Syriac Orthodox Christians are clearly not Muslims and thus should be able to benefit from the minority rights stipulated in the Lausanne Treaty of 1923, the Turkish State has granted these rights thus far only to Greeks, Armenians and Jews, with numerous infringements.

An adjustment of Turkish laws to European minority rights standards, long overdue, would not only solve the problem of the kindergarten, but would also create a modern frame of reference for all the other issues. Nothing revolutionary, just equal rights for all.

 

Ekrem Eddy Güzeldere

Urge Turkey to return Christian Churches

Earlier this year Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Scott Brown (R-MA) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) introduced "Return of Churches" legislation, calling on Turkey to return stolen Christian churches and to end discrimination against surviving Christian communities. A similar measure (H. RES. 306) was adopted by the U.S. House of Representatives in December, 2011.

The recent Turkish Supreme court's decision to confiscate the property owned by the Syriac Orthodox Church Mor (St.) Gabriel monastery and its declaration that Assyrians are "occupiers" is only a continuation of the same Ottoman/ Turkish policies of Genocide and religious persecution of non-Muslim ethnic groups of WWI and before which resulted in the death of over 2 million Armenians, Assyrians and Pontian Greeks and the forced deportation of hundreds of thousands of them.

We ask that you spend less than two minutes today and request that your U.S. Senators co-sponsor and work for the adoption of the "Return of Churches" resolution. Simply type your name below and then input your postal address, email address and send your message to your Senators.

 

Go hear to sign the petition:

 

http://www.causes.com/actions/1671927-urge-turkey-to-return-christian-churches

Christians in Syria Targeted for Kidnapping

Criminal gangs collude with Islamic extremist mercenaries, refugees say.

 

The remains of St. Mary's Church in Homs, Syria

 

 

ISTANBUL (Morning Star News) – In a poor gypsy neighborhood of Istanbul, a Syrian Orthodox refugee from Syria says he worked as a dentist in Aleppo as long as he could after fighting broke out in 2011; he finally fled when lack of food, electricity, water, and constant fear of sniper-fire and kidnapping of Christians made life too dangerous.

 

“Some people would come to my dental office and threaten me with kidnapping,” he says. “I finally had to close my practice.”

 

Living in an unheated house and keeping their voices down for fear of attracting police attention, 20 Syrian Orthodox Christians bundle up in winter jackets, drink Turkish coffee, and discuss the dangers of fleeing war-torn Syria and illegally crossing the border into Turkey. The middle-aged dentist, identified only as Ilyas, says in fluent English that friends and relatives were kidnapped by criminal groups operating freely due to the removal of central government control.

 

The refugee says he paid $6,000 to a smuggler to help him leave and crossed the border while under gunfire from an unknown group. He cannot get legal employment here but works occasionally translating Arabic to Turkish.

 

Another refugee from northern Syria, identified only as 35-year-old Ibrahim, fled when his aunt was kidnapped by a local criminal group. He said criminal group members were colluding with foreign Muslim extremists who have been flooding into the country to fight President Bashar al-Assad and set up an Islamic state. His aunt was eventually ransomed for $6,000.

 

Having crossed into Turkey after paying bribes at the border, Ibrahim worries about his future since Syria is no longer safe for Christians, while local charity groups in Turkey have ignored Syrian Orthodox refugees, he said.

 

“How can we stay in Turkey?” he said. “Nobody gives me a job because they don’t like Arabs, and it would be worse if they knew I were a Christian. Even charity organizations in Turkey don’t assist me when they find out I am a Christian.”

 

These refugees are among the thousands of Syrian Orthodox fleeing to nearby Middle East countries and Europe.

 

Those that flee to Europe face dangers by entrusting themselves to smugglers, who have created a multimillion dollar human trafficking business in the fallout of the war. Christians who stay in Syria risk attacks and executions by extremists. Either way, church leaders and activists fear Syria will soon lose its Christian population.

 

“There is a silent exodus of Christians from Syria,” Nuri Kino, a Swedish journalist of Assyrian background, told Morning Star News. “Unfortunately there are signs that what happened in Iraq is happening here – there are kidnappings, rapes, and YouTube videos put up of people being forcibly converted to Islam.”

 

Before the war, 1.4 million Christians lived in Syria, or 6.3 percent of the population of the Muslim-majority nation, according to Operation World. It is unclear how many remain now.

 

“It’s hell out there in Syria,” Kino said. “The Christians have a lack of faith and hope and are massively fleeing the country. They don’t believe someone is speaking out for them.”

 

Christians in Syria dwell among many other ethnic and religious groups, including Arabs, Kurds, Alawites and Druze. Assyrians are the largest Christian ethnic group. They speak Syriac, a Semitic dialect similar to the spoken language of Jesus, and have been established in the country since Christianity’s beginning.

 

Christians have been vulnerable since the beginning of the civil war that has left 60,000 dead. Unlike ethnic groups, they do not have armed militias to protect themselves and are scattered across the country. As a result, kidnappings of Christians have accelerated due to the perception that they are wealthy and lack armed security.

 

In the city of Hassaké, 50 Christians were kidnapped last month. Most recently, a Christian pharmacist was kidnapped earlier this month and held for a ransom of approximately 11,000 euros.

 

Many of those kidnapped are doctors, lawyers and other professionals, but now the poor are beginning to be kidnapped, Syrian Catholic Archbishop of Hassaké-Nisibi Jacques Behnan Hindo told Fides News Agency.

 

In the wake of such dangers, an intricate human smuggling ring has sprung up to profit off Assyrians fleeing inter-ethnic violence. Kino, who conducted interviews with more than 100 Assyrian refugees, released a report in early February entitled “Between the Barbed Wire” that describes the hardships refugees face and the atrocities Christians encounter in Syria.

 

In one case, smugglers packed a young man named Jacob into a shipping container with 70 other refugees for hours. They traveled four days to Italy in a tiny boat’s cargo hold and were forced to swim for shore a mile off.

 

Despite paying at least $17,000 to the smugglers, the refugees were forced at gunpoint to hike through miles of forest, squeeze into small spaces with little air, and go for days without food or water. Thirty of the 70 drowned since they could not swim after being stranded in a boat in the middle of a river.

 

Most Syrian Christian refugees attempt to reach Sweden, where a large Assyrian community has been established and many have family members. Approximately 30 Assyrians a week come to the Swedish town of Södertälje, 30 kilometers (19 miles) south of Stockholm, and Arabic and Syriac have supplanted Swedish as the lingua franca.

 

Those that do survive the trip and reach Sweden face a life of menial work as laborers even if they come from an educated background, Kino said.

 

“I know of [an Assyrian] doctor in Sweden who is seeking a job as a cleaner in an elderly care [center] while learning Swedish,” he said. “He doesn’t want to do this, but he has to [in order] to provide for his children and give them a safe future.”

 

Christian aid groups and monasteries in nearby countries are natural places for Syria’s Christians to seek refuge. Church leaders in Lebanon and Turkey are overwhelmed with the numbers arriving every day.

 

In Turkey’s southeastern city of Mardin, the Syrian Orthodox Deyrülzafaran Monastery has hosted hundreds of transient immigrants who avoid refugee camps in Turkey for fear of harsh treatment by Syrian Muslims. A refugee in Istanbul who requested anonymity told Morning Star News that he fled the Syrian army – and bypassed the refugee camps – in fear that he would be drafted into fighting for the rebel forces.

 

His aunt, he said, stayed in such a refugee camp and hid her Christian identity. An imam admonished her to return to Syria and commit jihad (Muslim holy war) against state forces, he said.

 

Rebels – Worst Option for Christians

Human rights groups have condemned the attacks against Christians and others as war crimes. Human Rights Watch (HRW) said assailants “deliberately destroyed religious sites” in moves of “unjustified attacks against minority places of worship” after areas had already come under opposition control.

 

According to an HRW reported released on Jan. 23, opposition gunmen raided churches after taking control of the Christian villages of Jdeideh and Ghasaniyeh in December. They broke into the churches, fired shots inside, stole numerous items and looted nearby houses.

 

Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at HRW, said in the report that such attacks are fueling sectarian fears and could drive Christians away from the country. Attacks on religious buildings not used for military purposes are war crimes.

 

“The opposition in Syria should back up its claims that it will uphold minority rights by protecting places of worship, and more generally ensuring that gunmen acting in its name respect civilians and civilian properties,” she said in the report.

 

Christians fear the opposition National Coalition more than Assad’s government. The worst prospect for them would be the rebels taking power, because the main fighting force is Jahdat al-Nusra, an extremist group with an ideology similar to that of al-Qaeda.

 

The civil war evolved out of the 2011 Arab Spring protests against the Syrian Ba’ath Party and decades-long rule of Assad’s family. After troops fired on protesters, these slowly changed into an armed opposition.

 

The Assad family is Alawite, a Shi’ite Islam sect that makes up only 12 percent of the population. They have marginalized Sunni Muslims, which make up three-fourths of the population, leading to sectarian resentment. Many analysts worry that such pent-up tensions will lead to a long, bloody insurgency similar to the Iraq War.

 

Overwhelming Influx

From such violence the refugees flee, with some ending up stranded in Turkey when smugglers lie to them about their final destination. Yakup Atuğ, director of the Syriac Help Foundation in Turkey, recalls assisting 30 refugees who were abandoned by smugglers in Turkey’s port city of Çanakkale.

 

The smugglers had told them they were in Greece.

 

“They were left in a forest in the rain with no money,” Atuğ said. “When the police came, they said, ‘We are Palestinians,’ and were sent to Istanbul to be processed through customs. They would have been deported if it were known they were Syrians.”

 

The smugglers had collected 1,000 euros each from the refugees, who wanted to reach Greece, as entering would facilitate access to the rest of the European Union. They were promised a German passport upon arrival. Instead, the refugees were abandoned in the port city, told it was Greece, and stayed in a rainstorm all night until the threat of severe illness forced them to seek out police.

 

Smugglers are notorious for cheating refugees of all backgrounds and did not target the Assyrians because of their Christian faith, Atuğ said.

 

“If they were Palestinian, they would have done the same,” he said. “They are like the mafia. They will take your old passport and promise to exchange it for a [European] one, only to copy down your address, come to your house armed, and rob everything.”

 

In Lebanon, church leaders are overwhelmed with the influx of Syrians. St. Gabriel’s Monastery in Ajaltoun, 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of Beirut, opened up its 75 unheated rooms to 100 refugees. School buildings and other structures are converted into temporary shelters.

 

Christian leaders hope that the refugees will eventually return to their homeland, but many believe it does not appear likely in the near future.

 

Another Arab country is losing its Christian Assyrian minority, said Archdeacon Emanuel Youkhana of the Assyrian Church of the East in an interview with Nina Shea, director of the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom.

 

“When it happened in Iraq, nobody believed Syria’s turn would come,” Youkhana told Shea. “Behind the daily reporting about bombs there is an ethno-religious cleansing taking place, and soon Syria can be emptied of its Christians.”

Mardin monastery becomes shelter for Syriac refugees

Vercihan Ziflioğlu

Syriac refugees escaping clashes in Syria are temporarily taking shelter in Mardin’s Deyrülzafaran Monastery before finding a way to a third country, the metropolitan bishop for Diyabakır and Mardin, Saliba Özmen, has told the Daily News.

Deyrülzafaran Monastery is the first Syriac foundation in Turkey to welcome the Syriac refugees, who have been avoiding refugee camps over security concerns.

The Syriac Union Party, Syriac National Council and Turkey Syriac Associations Federation members have recently conducted meetings with Ankara officials, including officials from the prime ministry, Özmen said, adding that Ankara agreed to provide support.

“We told them of our limited resources and we asked for financial support. Ankara promised to help and will soon begin providing financial support,” Özmen said.

Hospitals have also offered to help the monastery with the increasing number of incoming refugees, with the governor’s office working with health service officials to provide assistance.

There is no current need for a camp, according to Özmen, as those who arrive in Turkey then move to countries where they have relatives. “We don’t have the numbers for a camp, and we don’t need one currently.”

Turkey Syriac Associations Federation head Evgil Türker said they will continue to maintain contact with the Mardin Governorship to help refugees.

Syria reportedly has around 300,000 Syriacs within its borders.

Election Day in Armenia

Armenian President Serge Sarkisian, who has overseen a modest economic recovery in his country, was re-elected in a national election on Monday, according to an exit poll.

 

The poll of 19,130 voters conducted by Gallup and other pollsters and carried by ArmNews TV showed Sarkisian winning 58 percent of the ballots. The closest of his six rivals, the American-born Raffi Hovanessian, who was post-Soviet Armenia's first foreign minister, polled 32 percent.

 

Just over 60 percent of Armenia's 2.5 million eligible voters cast ballots in the election for the country's top official, according to the Central Election Commission. Full preliminary results are expected Tuesday.

 

A strong performance by Sarkisian appears to have helped him avoid a runoff, which would be required if no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote.

 

Sarkisian's victory had been widely expected. He has overseen a return to economic growth after years of stagnation, although the former Soviet republic still suffers from widespread poverty. World Bank figures for 2010, the most recent year tallied, show nearly 36 percent of the country living below the national poverty line. Average wages are about $300 a month.

 

The landlocked country's economy is hobbled by the longstanding closure of its borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey, both connected with the occupation by Armenian troops and ethnic Armenian local forces of the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. That conflict shows no signs of imminent resolution despite years of international mediation attempts.

 

The top challenger, Hovanessian, accused Sarkisian of losing the arms race with Azerbaijan. He also contended that billions of dollars have disappeared from the state budget because of corruption under Sarkisian, and emphasized the large number of Armenians leaving the country of 3 million to pursue better opportunities. The outward flow is estimated last year to have been about 3.3 people per 1,000 of the population.

 

Sarkisian's first term in 2008 started traumatically. Within weeks of his election, clashes between police and supporters of Sarkisian's vanquished challenger, Lev Ter-Petrosian, left 10 people dead and more than 250 wounded.

 

But Sarkisian adroitly reduced tensions by talking with critics and allowing opposition protests. The next year, parliament granted a sweeping amnesty to hundreds of people who had been arrested in the post-election violence.

 

This year's presidential campaign lasted only a month, but was packed in drama that included the shooting of one candidate and another contender going on a hunger strike.

Paruir Airikian, the candidate who was shot in the shoulder in a mysterious attack, finished third Monday with 3 percent of the ballot, according to the exit poll, apparently thanks to the outpouring of sympathy for him over the shooting.

 

A fringe candidate, political analyst Andrias Gukasian, has been on a hunger strike outside the national academy of sciences building in central Yerevan since the campaign opened Jan. 21, protesting alleged widespread vote-buying by Sarkisian's party.

 

An interim report on the campaign by the elections-monitoring arm of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe noted that some of Sarkisian's campaign offices are located in government buildings and that "the distinction between campaign activities and state functions appears to be blurred."

Religious symbols: taking faith too far?

By Brooke Anderson

The Daily Star

 

On dashboards, rearview mirrors and car windows are symbols that tell stories of different communities in a small divided country.

 

Owners of the small crosses, Qurans, religious verses, swords and fish symbols say that they are displaying their faith for protection or for a blessing. But those who refuse to profess their faith publicly scoff at it as a sign of sectarianism.

 

“People shouldn’t display religious symbols on their cars. If they do, they should put a Quran and a cross together,” says Ali Saleh, a taxi driver on Hamra Street, waiting for passengers. “The Bible and the Quran both have the same message – to treat people well. I keep my Quran at home.”

 

Fellow driver Abu Ayman has a Quran on his dashboard because, he says, “It gives me protection.”

“Don’t say that,” Saleh says. “People will laugh at us. God doesn’t protect people based on whether or not they have a Quran in their car. Mine is at home.”

 

“Ninety percent of people displaying religious symbols are doing it out of sectarianism,” he adds.

In Lebanon, where sectarian divisions pervaded in the Civil War and even other times of more recent strife, religious symbols serve as both a reminder of what divides Lebanese society as well as a comfort for those seeking solace in their faith.

 

Some people wear symbols of their faith around their neck, while others, more noticeably, plaster it on their cars and trucks, in what sometimes can seem like a competition. About five years ago, a trend among Christians was to plaster a large sticker on their rear window that read “King of Kings.”

Shortly thereafter, a sticker in the same pattern depicting Mecca also started appearing on cars.

 

At the Bible Society, a Christian souvenir shop in Downtown Beirut, Rita Khoury says her customers have various reasons for buying religious symbols. “Some people want to show people they’re Christian when they’re driving through different areas in Lebanon,” she says.

 

“Other people want a symbol to show their faith because if they get into an accident they would want to see a priest in their final moments. We also have a few Muslim customers who buy these as gifts for their Christian friends.”

 

At Nader, a shop that sells prayer beads on Hamra Street, Dima Dakakni, a regular customer, says she has at least 30 sets of prayer beads at home. She started making them at her mosque when she was a child during the war. Her brother likes to display his in his car. “Some people say they’re a blessing or good luck. I used to live in Jordan, and they weren’t as into religious symbols as they are here.”

Precisely because of the prevalence of these symbols in Lebanon, a country largely divided on religious and sectarian lines, secular activist May Abi Samra, who was part of the now-dormant anti-sectarian movement that began around five years ago, worries that they are intended to mean more than just a blessing.

 

“It shows how sectarian Lebanese society is, and it makes me think I don’t want to be like that,” she says. Abi Samra recalls once asking her friend why he put a cross on his rearview mirror. He told her it was “for protection,” to which she responded: “Then why does it have to be so visible?”

Asaad Thebian, who has also been involved in anti-sectarian activism, disagrees with the practice of displaying religious symbols in cars, particularly in taxis, where passengers don’t have the choice as to what they see.

 

“I think in the public vehicles there should be a law that bans using any religious symbol since the vehicle is to be used by different people from various backgrounds and it is not the right of the driver to confiscate their opinions. This also applies to the religious radio stations people listen to,” he says.

“As for private cars, I think it is a [matter of] personal freedom. But I do not agree it is a sign of faith; I think it is rather a sign of lack of faith when a person needs a visual reminder to let them know that God exists.”

 

For Father Tony, a Maronite priest based in Harissa, the question of whether someone should show a religious symbol on their car isn’t clear-cut. For him, it depends on their motivation.

“There are extremists, there are those who show their religion out of fear of God, and those who love their faith and aren’t ashamed of it,” he says.

 

Father Tony believes the third reason is the only justification to show one’s faith. If people decide to display their faith on their car, then they have the responsibility to represent their faith well by not littering and obeying traffic laws.

 

“Obviously people I ask give intrinsic motivations,” says Charles Harb, a psychology professor at the American University of Beirut, who specializes in identity and group dynamics. “But these symbols are also there to declare and perceive someone’s identity with a particular group.

 

“At the same time, there was the reverse trend. You’d see people with stickers on their cars reading, ‘Say no to sectarianism,’” Harb notes, adding that when someone doesn’t display a symbol – particularly in Lebanon, where they’re so prevalent – it’s tantamount to making a statement.

“It’s odd. People are also taking a stand. The absence of a symbol is just as noticeable as the presence of one.”

 

Although he’s not overly concerned with overt displays of religion, Harb, himself a secularist, says, “At the end of the day it’s a symptom of group division. Lebanon is particular because of the presence of multiple sects. In this country, the power and resources are based on sectarian alliance and group identity.”

 

He sees symbols on cars as a much bolder statement than those worn around the neck.

 

“On the car, it’s a bigger statement. Either you’re proselytizing or you’re showing your sectarianism. You’re claiming space, and that’s potent in Lebanon,” he says.

“Imagine what it looks like to someone who’s feeling fear.”

2 priests kidnapped in Syria

To all my family and friends: Please pray for the release of the 2 priests who were kidnapped in Syria by the militants. Please read the story as was told by the catholic news agency.

ASIA/SYRIA - Two priests kidnapped by the rebels. Archbishop Marayati: let us wait to know what they want

Aleppo (Agenzia Fides) - The fate of the two priests Michel Kayyal (Armenian Catholic) and Maher Mahfouz (Greek Orthodox) kidnapped by a group of armed rebels on Saturday, February 9 on the road that leads from Aleppo to Damascus remains unknown. So far the purpose of the seizure is not clear nor the faction of the group of kidnappers, but eloquent details emerge on the dynamics of the kidnapping. "The two priests - the Armenian Catholic Archbishop of Aleppo reports to Fides Agency, Boutros Marayati - were traveling on a public bus, along with many other people. They were heading to the Salesian house in Kafrun, together with the Salesian priest Fr. Charbel. Thirty miles outside of Aleppo, the rebels stopped the vehicle, checked the passengers' documents and then they told only the two priests to get out of the vehicle and brought them away with them right away. They said nothing to the Salesian priest. Before leaving, they said that they would say something about their conditions. But so far family members and all of us have not received any message." Among the priests' relatives and all the Christians of Aleppo, as time goes by, there is growing apprehension. (GV) (Agenzia Fides 12/02/2013).

It is already February...

 

I cannot believe that it is already February.  I cannot believe how much has happened since I arrived.  The first month was extremely busy.  I began a conversational English Club for teens that meets twice per week in an Evangelical school that belongs to AMAA, the organization where I work.  Last night I began another conversational English class for young adults in AMAA's new leadership center.  There is a lot of interest in practicing English in this country where Russian is the second language.   There are not many opportunities to practice speaking English, yet it is essential in the labor market.  I was not able to take all the students who were interested.  I think that teaching these classes will be a very good educational and practical experience both for the students and myself. 

 

I have also been given the chance to take on a journalistic role at AMAA.  The organization sends me to its events, schools, projects and all the organizations that it supports.  I get to go and interview the staff and write articles for AMAA's newsletter and reports. 

 

The biggest project I worked on was a film about AMAA's child sponsorship program.  People living in the U.S. and Europe can sponsor a child in Armenia.  Every year, AMAA has to make a new film for a group of women who fundraise for this program in California.  We chose children from four families who are living in extreme poverty.  I went with the social worker, producer and camera operator, to visit each child's home and take some notes about the situation.  Then I had to write a script for the film and record my voice for the narration.  Today I watched the film and I think it will be powerful.  If it is possible, I will post it on my blog soon.

 

 



Giving up on love: the refugee reality

By Brooke Anderson
The Daily Star Lebanon

Being a refugee often means leaving everything behind. For many that means their house, clothes, friends and family. For some young women, it also means leaving behind dreams of falling in love and getting married.

 

“When we were kids we used to dream about love, but not anymore,” said Fatima Sultan, 25, who arrived in Tripoli with her family from Idlib, northwestern Syria, a month ago.

 

They are now staying in a small and stuffy apartment in the impoverished and often violent Bab al-Tabbaneh neighborhood of Tripoli.

 

With no prospects of returning to Syria or gaining employment in Lebanon, she sees marriage as the best way out of her predicament.

 

For the past few weeks, a 40-year-old divorced sheikh originally from Hama has been scouting the area in search of a Syrian bride. He has approached Sultan’s family with his intentions, and she says she is considering the offer, even though she doesn’t know the man – let alone love him.

“Maybe I’ll grow to love him after we get married,” said Sultan, shrugging, as she sits with her extended family on the floor of the cramped and stuffy apartment in a building riddled with bullet holes.

 

She is one of many Syrian women across the region whose families are being approached for marriage by older, wealthier men. As the fighting continues across the border, many women are left without their fathers and husbands, the family breadwinners.

Destitute women considering marriage to escape poverty is nothing new. But the problem can be particularly acute among refugees, a vulnerable population with few resources or connections in their host country.

 

Omar, who gives only his first name, hails from Idlib. He has been helping Syrian refugees, through the local branch of a Syrian-based charity, to meet their basic humanitarian needs since the unrest began two years ago.

 

He says that nearly a year and a half ago, when violence in Homs first broke out, he began getting requests from men searching for Syrian brides. Not all of them are wealthy, but most do have stable jobs – something the newly arrived refugees tend to lack.

 

Omar says these days he gets up to 20 inquiries a day from men looking for Syrian brides – never the other way around. It is typically men who approach his charity with their requests.

 

He says he has seen cases of men up to 65 years old looking to marry teenagers, and others whose motives are mainly financial or sexual and have no intention of staying married for long.

He is against the practice of such arranged marriages, Omar adds, and takes his job of helping Syrian refugees very seriously.

 

“In the beginning, we were just helping people with food and health care,” he said. “It’s really a shame. No one is doing anything to help them.”

 

He believes that some of the men seeking Syrian brides genuinely want to help the women and says they do their best to vet these men.

 

Not everyone agrees. Head of the Tripoli-based Bashaer Charity, Ahmad Mustafa Mohammad, refuses to have anything to do with marriage requests. He said he’s seen some individual cases of people seeking to arrange marriages with young Syrian women.

 

In one instance, an already-married Lebanese man from the north with seven children approached the charity saying he was looking for a young Syrian girl. Another time, a Syrian mother told Mohammad that she wanted to find a husband for her two teenage daughters.

 

“I tell them I don’t do this kind of work. We try to stay away from this,” he says. Otherwise, “If we involved ourselves, people would think we were peddling women.”

 

In the end, he adds, “It’s their choice. I can’t stop them.”

 

Dana Sleiman, communications officer at the United Nations Higher Commission for Refugees, says they are doing as much as they can to raise awareness about the issue, although it can be difficult for them to reach young women or gauge the scope of the practice due to its sensitive nature.

 

“On our end, we’re doing as much as we can to discourage women from marrying early,” Sleiman says. “We’ve done awareness sessions with women and girls so they don’t feel like they need to resort to this.”

 

She adds, “It all comes down to economics. It’s not new to the environment, especially in a displacement setting.”

 

Omar says they do what they can to screen these men, some of whom he believes genuinely want to care for Syrian refugee women. He doesn’t think that the sheikh who wants to marry Sultan, for example, has good intentions, and has told her family so.

 

But some refugee families, despite their desperate situations, are still holding onto the hope that their daughters will find a real relationship rather than one based purely on practicality.

 

“I’ve heard about this a lot,” says Amni Mohammad, referring to the trend of men looking for Syrian brides.

 

With her 16-year-old daughter, Walaa, sitting by her side on the floor, she says: “I don’t want that for my daughter. I want her to marry someone she loves. His nationality isn’t important. What’s important is that he’s working or studying, doing something with his life and that he’s a real partner.”

Gustav Klimt’s painting “The Kiss” has been reproduced on a devastated building in Syria by artist Tammam Azzam

Watch this video about an area in Syria with 44 churches where the Christians have formed a militia to guard the neighborhood...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9kO4dDl8AM

1979: Mother Teresa's Nobel Lecture...just a few things to think about

As we have gathered here together to thank God for the Nobel Peace Prize I think it will be beautiful that we pray the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi which always surprises me very much - we pray this prayer every day after Holy Communion, because it is very fitting for each one of us, and I always wonder that 4-500 years ago as St. Francis of Assisi composed this prayer that they had the same difficulties that we have today, as we compose this prayer that fits very nicely for us also. I think some of you already have got it - so we will pray together.²

 

Let us thank God for the opportunity that we all have together today, for this gift of peace that reminds us that we have been created to live that peace, and Jesus became man to bring that good news to the poor. He being God became man in all things like us except sin, and he proclaimed very clearly that he had come to give the good news. The news was peace to all of good will and this is something that we all want - the peace of heart - and God loved the world so much that he gave his son - it was a giving - it is as much as if to say it hurt God to give, because he loved the world so much that he gave his son, and he gave him to Virgin Mary, and what did she do with him?

 

As soon as he came in her life - immediately she went in haste to give that good news, and as she came into the house of her cousin, the child - the unborn child - the child in the womb of Elizabeth, leapt with joy. He was that little unborn child, was the first messenger of peace. He recognised the Prince of Peace, he recognised that Christ has come to bring the good news for you and for me. And as if that was not enough - it was not enough to become a man - he died on the cross to show that greater love, and he died for you and for me and for that leper and for that man dying of hunger and that naked person lying in the street not only of Calcutta, but of Africa, and New York, and London, and Oslo - and insisted that we love one another as he loves each one of us. And we read that in the Gospel very clearly - love as I have loved you - as I love you - as the Father has loved me, I love you - and the harder the Father loved him, he gave him to us, and how much we love one another, we, too, must give each other until it hurts. It is not enough for us to say: I love God, but I do not love my neighbour. St. John says you are a liar if you say you love God and you don't love your neighbour. How can you love God whom you do not see, if you do not love your neighbour whom you see, whom you touch, with whom you live. And so this is very important for us to realise that love, to be true, has to hurt. It hurt Jesus to love us, it hurt him. And to make sure we remember his great love he made himself the bread of life to satisfy our hunger for his love. Our hunger for God, because we have been created for that love. We have been created in his image. We have been created to love and be loved, and then he has become man to make it possible for us to love as he loved us. He makes himself the hungry one - the naked one - the homeless one - the sick one - the one in prison - the lonely one - the unwanted one - and he says: You did it to me. Hungry for our love, and this is the hunger of our poor people. This is the hunger that you and I must find, it may be in our own home.

 

I never forget an opportunity I had in visiting a home where they had all these old parents of sons and daughters who had just put them in an institution and forgotten maybe. And I went there, and I saw in that home they had everything, beautiful things, but everybody was looking towards the door. And I did not see a single one with their smile on their face. And I turned to the Sister and I asked: How is that? How is it that the people they have everything here, why are they all looking towards the door, why are they not smiling? I am so used to see the smile on our people, even the dying one smile, and she said: This is nearly every day, they are expecting, they are hoping that a son or daughter will come to visit them. They are hurt because they are forgotten, and see - this is where love comes. That poverty comes right there in our own home, even neglect to love. Maybe in our own family we have somebody who is feeling lonely, who is feeling sick, who is feeling worried, and these are difficult days for everybody. Are we there, are we there to receive them, is the mother there to receive the child?

 

I was surprised in the West to see so many young boys and girls given into drugs, and I tried to find out why - why is it like that, and the answer was: Because there is no one in the family to receive them. Father and mother are so busy they have no time. Young parents are in some institution and the child takes back to the street and gets involved in something. We are talking of peace. These are things that break peace, but I feel the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a direct war, a direct killing - direct murder by the mother herself. And we read in the Scripture, for God says very clearly: Even if a mother could forget her child - I will not forget you - I have carved you in the palm of my hand. We are carved in the palm of His hand, so close to Him that unborn child has been carved in the hand of God. And that is what strikes me most, the beginning of that sentence, that even if a mother could forget something impossible - but even if she could forget - I will not forget you. And today the greatest means - the greatest destroyer of peace is abortion. And we who are standing here - our parents wanted us. We would not be here if our parents would do that to us. Our children, we want them, we love them, but what of the millions. Many people are very, very concerned with the children in India, with the children in Africa where quite a number die, maybe of malnutrition, of hunger and so on, but millions are dying deliberately by the will of the mother. And this is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today. Because if a mother can kill her own child - what is left for me to kill you and you kill me - there is nothing between. And this I appeal in India, I appeal everywhere: Let us bring the child back, and this year being the child's year: What have we done for the child? At the beginning of the year I told, I spoke everywhere and I said: Let us make this year that we make every single child born, and unborn, wanted. And today is the end of the year, have we really made the children wanted? I will give you something terrifying. We are fighting abortion by adoption, we have saved thousands of lives, we have sent words to all the clinics, to the hospitals, police stations - please don't destroy the child, we will take the child. So every hour of the day and night it is always somebody, we have quite a number of unwedded mothers - tell them come, we will take care of you, we will take the child from you, and we will get a home for the child. And we have a tremendous demand from families who have no children, that is the blessing of God for us. And also, we are doing another thing which is very beautiful - we are teaching our beggars, our leprosy patients, our slum dwellers, our people of the street, natural family planning.

 

And in Calcutta alone in six years - it is all in Calcutta - we have had 61,273 babies less from the families who would have had, but because they practise this natural way of abstaining, of self-control, out of love for each other. We teach them the temperature meter which is very beautiful, very simple, and our poor people understand. And you know what they have told me? Our family is healthy, our family is united, and we can have a baby whenever we want. So clear - those people in the street, those beggars - and I think that if our people can do like that how much more you and all the others who can know the ways and means without destroying the life that God has created in us.

The poor people are very great people. They can teach us so many beautiful things. The other day one of them came to thank and said: You people who have vowed chastity you are the best people to teach us family planning. Because it is nothing more than self-control out of love for each other. And I think they said a beautiful sentence. And these are people who maybe have nothing to eat, maybe they have not a home where to live, but they are great people. The poor are very wonderful people. One evening we went out and we picked up four people from the street. And one of them was in a most terrible condition - and I told the Sisters: You take care of the other three, I take of this one that looked worse. So I did for her all that my love can do. I put her in bed, and there was such a beautiful smile on her face. She took hold of my hand, as she said one word only: Thank you - and she died.

 

I could not help but examine my conscience before her, and I asked what would I say if I was in her place. And my answer was very simple. I would have tried to draw a little attention to myself, I would have said I am hungry, that I am dying, I am cold, I am in pain, or something, but she gave me much more - she gave me her grateful love. And she died with a smile on her face. As that man whom we picked up from the drain, half eaten with worms, and we brought him to the home. I have lived like an animal in the street, but I am going to die like an angel, loved and cared for. And it was so wonderful to see the greatness of that man who could speak like that, who could die like that without blaming anybody, without cursing anybody, without comparing anything. Like an angel - this is the greatness of our people. And that is why we believe what Jesus had said: I was hungry - I was naked - I was homeless - I was unwanted, unloved, uncared for - and you did it to me.

 

I believe that we are not real social workers. We may be doing social work in the eyes of the people, but we are really contemplatives in the heart of the world. For we are touching the Body of Christ 24 hours. We have 24 hours in this presence, and so you and I. You too try to bring that presence of God in your family, for the family that prays together stays together. And I think that we in our family don't need bombs and guns, to destroy to bring peace - just get together, love one another, bring that peace, that joy, that strength of presence of each other in the home. And we will be able to overcome all the evil that is in the world.

 

There is so much suffering, so much hatred, so much misery, and we with our prayer, with our sacrifice are beginning at home. Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do, but how much love we put in the action that we do. It is to God Almighty - how much we do it does not matter, because He is infinite, but how much love we put in that action. How much we do to Him in the person that we are serving.

 

Some time ago in Calcutta we had great difficulty in getting sugar, and I don't know how the word got around to the children, and a little boy of four years old, Hindu boy, went home and told his parents: I will not eat sugar for three days, I will give my sugar to Mother Teresa for her children. After three days his father and mother brought him to our home. I had never met them before, and this little one could scarcely pronounce my name, but he knew exactly what he had come to do. He knew that he wanted to share his love.

 

And this is why I have received such a lot of love from you all. From the time that I have come here I have simply been surrounded with love, and with real, real understanding love. It could feel as if everyone in India, everyone in Africa is somebody very special to you. And I felt quite at home I was telling Sister today. I feel in the Convent with the Sisters as if I am in Calcutta with my own Sisters. So completely at home here, right here.

 

And so here I am talking with you - I want you to find the poor here, right in your own home first. And begin love there. Be that good news to your own people. And find out about your next-door neighbour - do you know who they are? I had the most extraordinary experience with a Hindu family who had eight children. A gentleman came to our house and said: Mother Teresa, there is a family with eight children, they had not eaten for so long - do something. So I took some rice and I went there immediately. And I saw the children - their eyes shinning with hunger - I don't know if you have ever seen hunger. But I have seen it very often. And she took the rice, she divided the rice, and she went out. When she came back I asked her - where did you go, what did you do? And she gave me a very simple answer: They are hungry also. What struck me most was that she knew - and who are they, a Muslim family - and she knew. I didn't bring more rice that evening because I wanted them to enjoy the joy of sharing. But there were those children, radiating joy, sharing the joy with their mother because she had the love to give. And you see this is where love begins - at home. And I want you - and I am very grateful for what I have received. It has been a tremendous experience and I go back to India - I will be back by next week, the 15th I hope - and I will be able to bring your love.

And I know well that you have not given from your abundance, but you have given until it has hurt you. Today the little children they have - I was so surprised - there is so much joy for the children that are hungry. That the children like themselves will need love and care and tenderness, like they get so much from their parents. So let us thank God that we have had this opportunity to come to know each other, and this knowledge of each other has brought us very close. And we will be able to help not only the children of India and Africa, but will be able to help the children of the whole world, because as you know our Sisters are all over the world. And with this prize that I have received as a prize of peace, I am going to try to make the home for many people that have no home. Because I believe that love begins at home, and if we can create a home for the poor - I think that more and more love will spread. And we will be able through this understanding love to bring peace, be the good news to the poor. The poor in our own family first, in our country and in the world.

 

To be able to do this, our Sisters, our lives have to be woven with prayer. They have to be woven with Christ to be able to understand, to be able to share. Because today there is so much suffering - and I feel that the passion of Christ is being relived all over again - are we there to share that passion, to share that suffering of people. Around the world, not only in the poor countries, but I found the poverty of the West so much more difficult to remove. When I pick up a person from the street, hungry, I give him a plate of rice, a piece of bread, I have satisfied. I have removed that hunger. But a person that is shut out, that feels unwanted, unloved, terrified, the person that has been thrown out from society - that poverty is so hurtable and so much, and I find that very difficult. Our Sisters are working amongst that kind of people in the West. So you must pray for us that we may be able to be that good news, but we cannot do that without you, you have to do that here in your country. You must come to know the poor, maybe our people here have material things, everything, but I think that if we all look into our own homes, how difficult we find it sometimes to smile at each, other, and that the smile is the beginning of love.

 

And so let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love, and once we begin to love each other naturally we want to do something. So you pray for our Sisters and for me and for our Brothers, and for our Co-Workers that are around the world. That we may remain faithful to the gift of God, to love Him and serve Him in the poor together with you. What we have done we should not have been able to do if you did not share with your prayers, with your gifts, this continual giving. But I don't want you to give me from your abundance, I want that you give me until it hurts.

 

The other day I received 15 dollars from a man who has been on his back for twenty years, and the only part that he can move is his right hand. And the only companion that he enjoys is smoking. And he said to me: I do not smoke for one week, and I send you this money. It must have been a terrible sacrifice for him, but see how beautiful, how he shared, and with that money I bought bread and I gave to those who are hungry with a joy on both sides, he was giving and the poor were receiving. This is something that you and I - it is a gift of God to us to be able to share our love with others. And let it be as it was for Jesus. Let us love one another as he loved us. Let us love Him with undivided love. And the joy of loving Him and each other - let us give now - that Christmas is coming so close. Let us keep that joy of loving Jesus in our hearts. And share that joy with all that we come in touch with. And that radiating joy is real, for we have no reason not to be happy because we have no Christ with us. Christ in our hearts, Christ in the poor that we meet, Christ in the smile that we give and the smile that we receive. Let us make that one point: That no child will be unwanted, and also that we meet each other always with a smile, especially when it is difficult to smile.

 

I never forget some time ago about fourteen professors came from the United States from different universities. And they came to Calcutta to our house. Then we were talking about that they had been to the home for the dying. We have a home for the dying in Calcutta, where we have picked up more than 36,000 people only from the streets of Calcutta, and out of that big number more than 18,000 have died a beautiful death. They have just gone home to God; and they came to our house and we talked of love, of compassion, and then one of them asked me: Say, Mother, please tell us something that we will remember, and I said to them: Smile at each other, make time for each other in your family. Smile at each other. And then another one asked me: Are you married, and I said: Yes, and I find it sometimes very difficult to smile at Jesus because he can be very demanding sometimes. This is really something true, and there is where love comes - when it is demanding, and yet we can give it to Him with joy. Just as I have said today, I have said that if I don't go to Heaven for anything else I will be going to Heaven for all the publicity because it has purified me and sacrificed me and made me really ready to go to Heaven. I think that this is something, that we must live life beautifully, we have Jesus with us and He loves us. If we could only remember that God loves me, and I have an opportunity to love others as he loves me, not in big things, but in small things with great love, then Norway becomes a nest of love. And how beautiful it will be that from here a centre for peace has been given. That from here the joy of life of the unborn child comes out. If you become a burning light in the world of peace, then really the Nobel Peace Prize is a gift of the Norwegian people. God bless you!.