By Baghdadhope*
On June 2 ended the academic year of Babel College, the only university for the study of Christian theology in Iraq.
The ceremony, held in the convent of the Chaldean Patriarchate dedicated to the Saints Addai and Mari in Ankawa, saw the participation of hundreds of people.
Of the 90 students from central and northern Iraq, 85 took the diploma of the Institute of Religious Studies and 5 the Baccalaureate in philosophy and theology.
Three of these five are seminarists of the Chaldean patriarchal seminary of St. Peter in Ankawa and will be ordained priests within the year: Hirmiz B. Hirmiz (Baghdad), Lusian A. (Mosul), Yousif Y. Yousif (Duhok).
The ceremony, during which were handed also the diplomas of the Università Urbaniana of Rome to which Babel College is affiliated to the students of the academic year 2008-2009, was attended by Msgr. Jacques Isaac, the Chaldean Patriarchal Vicar for cultural affairs and dean of the Babel College, by Msgr. Emil Nona and Msgr. George Alqas Musa, respectively Chaldean and Syriac Catholic bishops of Mosul and by the newly appointed Chaldean bishop of Erbil, Msgr. Bashar Warda, besides of course priests nuns and students’ relatives and friends. The ceremony was also marked by moments of reflection. To Father Fadi Lion Nissan and to Father Salem Saka was given the task of guiding the reflection on the role of the priest and that of Babel College as an institution responsible for the preparation of persons able to live and explain their faith. To Msgr. Jacques Isaac that of recalling the story of Babel College in recent years.
Baghdadhope recalls how these last years were very difficult as it’s clear if we remember that the see of the Chaldean Major Seminary and Babel College in Ankawa is active only since early January 2007 when, following a long string of violence that hit the Christian community in Baghdad, it was decided to transfer them from the capital for security reasons. Since then the two institutions began a new life. The relative stability and security of Iraqi Kurdistan and the active collaboration of the Kurdish government through the Christian Sarkis Aghajan, its former finance minister who, as Msgr. Shleimun Warduni stated at the inauguration of the seminary building in 2008 “Funded the cost of the building [of the seminar]” gave new hope to a church that sees in those institutions the continuation of its long history. A hope however veiled by the melancholy that always accompanies those who do not choose but are forced to leave their homes of origin, and that renews the desire to reestablish the institutions in Baghdad, "when peace comes" as recently stated by Msgr. Shleimun Warduni.