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How you can help » Equipment for the pastoral centre of the Chaldean sisters in Karamles, northern Iraq
Equipment for the pastoral centre of the Chaldean sisters in Karamles, northern Iraq
At the new Pastoral Center of the Chaldean Sisters of Daughters of Mary the Immaculate (DMI) in Karamles-Niniveh. @ACN
Karamles lies close to the famous city of Niniveh in northern Iraq and has suffered a chequered history. This traditionally Christian town, around 18 miles (29 km) southeast of Mosul, was inhabited for 5,000 years by Assyrians. It was here that Alexander the Great inflicted a crushing defeat on the army of Darius III. Today there are around 1000 families living in Karamles, many of them from Mosul and Baghdad. Most of them belong to the Chaldean Catholic Church. For a year now there has been a new educational and pastoral centre in Karamles, for children, young people and adults. It is here that a congregation of Chaldean Catholic sisters, the Daughters of Immaculate Mary run a range of courses and encounters aimed at "educating and inspiring" young people "so that they can live their Christian mission", as the Superior of the sisters, Philip Korma, puts it.
"The Chaldean Sisters have been working in Karamles since 1942. The commission has always been in the pastoral field", explains the Superior. In addition to the religious education of children and young people, the congregation also organises the choirs in four parishes. They regularly visit the families in the town and organise special meetings for girls. Among their regular duties is preparing the children for their First Holy Communion in the parishes of the town. The education and training of young people is one of the principal tasks of these sisters. Young people in Iraq are growing up today in a climate of warfare and chaos and it is this new generation that will have to face the challenge of steering their country back to peace and good order. Education is a precondition of this, so that the new generation will gain the knowledge and understanding the need to rebuild their country and promote a climate of genuine peaceful coexistence.
For now though, reconciliation is something the country scarcely knows. Many Iraqi Christians are dying a violent death. For example the young priest Father Ragheed Aziz Ganni, who was murdered outside his church just after Sunday Mass. ACN had helped fund the training of this 35-year-old Iraqi priest in Italy. Nine months later his own bishop, Archbishop Faraj Raho, who had celebrated his funeral Mass, was himself abducted and shortly afterwards found murdered.
The educational and pastoral centre is now fully open, and for some time now the schoolboys and schoolgirls have been coming, not only from Karamles, to the sisters. But there is a need for additional technical equipment, so that the courses can be more effectively addressed to the many participants. ACN has already helped for this and gave €18,000 last year (2009) so that the centre could be equipped with computers, photocopiers and a TV and audio system.
To know about this and many other similar projects in favour of the pastoral needs of the suffering Church, please contact our national offices.