By Baghdadhope*Sources of the news: Chaldean.org, Iraqchurch.com, Nadibabil.com, Ankawa.com, Michigan Catholic.com, Mar Eliya Church-Baghdad.
In the photo: The invitation card for the ordination of Father Ameer Gammo and Father Hirmiz Potros Hirmiz
Times of changes for the Chaldean church in Iraq and worldwide.
On July 3, in the church dedicated to the Mother of God in Southfield, Michigan (USA) Msgr. Ibrahim N. Ibrahim, bishop of the Chaldean diocese of St. Thomas the Apostle, ordained to the priesthood Father Fawaz Kako. Born in Baghdad, Father Kako, entered the Chaldean Seminary at age of 14 and at that of 21 the Congregation of the Redemptorists that sent him to study theology in Germany. In 2006 he moved to the United States where he continued his studies at the Catholic University of Theology in Chicago while his family had already left Iraq for Australia in 2004 because of the widespread violence. In 2008 he was assigned to the church of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Warren where he pledged to help new immigrants from Iraq.
On 9 July in the Dohuk Chaldean bishop of Zakho, Msgr. Petrus Harbouli, at the presence of the bishop of Amadhiya, Msgr. Rabban Al Qas, celebrated the Holy Mass for the ordination of Father Yousef Yako.
On July 16 it was the turn of two new priests ordained by the Chaldean Archbishop of Kirkuk, Msgr. Louis Sako at the presence of the Archbishop Emeritus of Kirkuk, Msgr. Andreas Sana, and the current Archbishop of Mosul, Msgr. Emile Nona.
On July 23, the Chaldean bishop of Mosul, Msgr. Emile Nona, celebrated in the church of Mar Addai in Karamles the Holy Mass for the ordination of Father Lucien Ayub Babaqa.
Fr. Babaqa was born in 1974. A graduate of Mosul Institute of Technology he studied at Babel College, where he was a top student also paying service in the library and getting a BA in philosophy and thelogy on last June. Fr. Babaqa belongs to a family that has already given a bishop to the Chaldean Church: Msgr. Stephan Babaqa, Archbishop of Arbil. (1919 - + 2007)
On August 6 in Michigan (USA) Msgr. Ibrahim N. Ibrahim, Bishop of the Chaldean Diocese of St. Thomas the Apostle, celebrated the Mass of consecration of the new church of the Holy Martyrs. Father Manuel Boji, who was appointed as parish priest, will be assisted by Father Ayad Hanna.
In the church dedicated to martyrs were exhibited, among others, the photos of Archbishop Paulus Faraj Rahho, the archbishop of Mosul kidnapped and killed in March 2008, that of Father Ragheed Ganni, the young priest killed in Mosul in June 2007 and of the seventyone years old Sister Cecilia Moshi Hanna who was killed in cold blood on August 15th 2002 (before of the last war on Iraq) by three assailants who stabbed her and who, as reported, decapitated her body in the convent of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart in Baghdad.
The ceremony was attended by many faithful, priests and nuns and, among others, by Father Basil Yaldo of church dedicated to St. George in Shelby Township (MI), by Father Muhannad Al Tawil, O.P. who guides the faithful of Lyon in France and by Father Benjamin Beth Yadegar, pastor of the first Eastern Rite Catholic church established in Georgia only in 2009: the Chaldean church dedicated to Mar Shimoun Bar Sabbae.
Father Manuel Boji was born in Telkeif (Iraq) in 1946. At 12 he entered the Chaldean monastery in Mosul and at 22 he was ordained a priest in Baghdad. Assigned to Telkeif he stayed there for 19 years and in 1987 he was transferred for six months in the church of Mar Addai in Oak Park (MI). From 1988 to 1990 he was the administrator of the Sacred Heart Church in Detroit (MI), meanwhile completing his doctorate. In 1990 he was appointed rector of the Cathedral of the Mother of God in Southfield (MI).
Father Ayad J. Hanna was born in Baghdad in 1975 where he attended the patriarchal seminar Chaldean and where he was ordained priest in 1999. After returning to his diocese, that of Amadhiya, in northern Iraq in 2001 he was named pastor of the church of San George in Mangesh in 2006 and afterwards he was assigned to the Diocese of St. Thomas the Apostle (USA).
On August 13, in Mar Eliya Church in Baghdad, the Chaldean Patriarch, Cardinal Mar Emmanuel III Delly, celebrated the Holy Mass for the ordination of two new priests, Father Ameer Gammo and Father Hirmiz Potros Hirmiz.
Father Ameer Gammo was born in 1981 and currently studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome the city where he was ordained deacon on May 1, 2010, in the church of Sant'Andrea.
Father Hirmiz Potros Hirmiz was born in 1986 and on last June he received his BA in philosophy and theology at Babel College in Ankawa together with Father Lucien Ayub Babaqa and Father Yousef Yako.