By Baghdadhope*
100,000 is the estimated number of faithful of the Catholic Chaldean church living in Europe, according to Msgr. Philip Najim, Chaldean Church Apostolic Visitor for the old continent and procurator to the Holy See.
"To them" he said in an interview to Baghdadhope, "is dedicated this new website online since May 18 that aims to become the virtual center of information and union for the faithful living in many European countries."
The Chaldeans, old and new immigrants, live all over Europe but mainly in Sweden, Germany and France. To dedicate to them a website that deals with, as stated by Msgr. Najim, the news but also the daily life of the Chaldeans, means stressing the importance of the phenomenon of diaspora that in most cases - especially in that of the newcomers - arose from difficulties of various kinds in the different countries of origin, especially Iraq and Turkey.
"I put forward the idea of a website," said Msgr. Najim "during the annual meeting of the Chaldean priests working in Europe held in Rome on last year. All the priests accepted it and now, not even a year later, it has become a reality."
How is the site organized?
"There is a priest in charge of the web site, Father Firaz Ghazi, the parish priest of our church in Holland, and a committee of Chaldeans - among them writers and scientists too - who have the responsibility for the content posted. There is a network of control spread across Europe. This is not censorship but as the readers' opinions will be accepted, and indeed encouraged, a wide linguistic knowledge is necessary. The site is in Arabic and English but there are persons who do not how to write these languages and they must feel free to express themselves in other languages."
Will the site host advertisements for funding?
"Yes, but not in the home page. It is also a way to know all the activities managed by Chaldeans in Europe, to show our desire for integration, that however, I want to emphasize, does not mean cancellation of our origins. The same site can and must become a mean for their preservation and to diffuse the knowledge of our community among our European brothers. For this reason, we hope to have contacts with the Catholic information media that can help us to grow and to diffuse our history and our reality. The site is at its start, it will need adjustments and setups, but I am sure it will be a success and an important step for our community. For this reason I want to thank everyone who participated and will partecipate to its birth and its life."
The website Chaldean in Europe is divided into several sections some of which (births, condolences, holidays, weddings etc..) are dedicated to the daily life of the Chaldean community. There is a guestbook which already has a first participation from the Netherlands, the space for publishing photos and an interesting introduction by Msgr. Najim.
Starting with a brief history of the Chaldean church linked to the figure of St. Thomas the Apostle Msgr. Najim explains the current status of the church in communion with Rome for faith and sacraments, but with different traditions of liturgy and canon law governed by the Code of Canon Law for Eastern Churches, and the leadership of which is entrusted to the patriarch, now the Cardinal Mar Emmanuel III Delly.
A church that has 8 archdioceses, nine dioceses and 20 bishops, 112 parishes and 3 missions served by 150 priests worldwide. There is a monastic order, the Antoniano Order of Saint Hormizda of the Chaldean that has 40 monks, a major seminary in Iraq and one in the U.S.A, three orders of nuns, two in Iraq, the Chaldean Daughters of Mary Immaculate and the Sacred Heart Chaldean Sisters, and one in San Diego (California) the Chaldean Sisters of the Workers of the Vineyard.
Following there is a detailed list of the Chaldean church realities across Europe.
From Baghdadhope sincere best wishes to all those who will work for Chaldean in Europe and will help us learn more about the Chaldean community.