Mgr Bashar Warda speaks to AsiaNews about the atmosphere that reigns among the refugees during Advent. A desire to go home to "rebuild the future" is the prevailing feeling. The Jubilee of Mercy offers an opportunity to "listen to their cry of pain" and undertake a "personal journey" of rebirth in God's love.

Erbil (AsiaNews) - Catholics in Erbil, both locals and refugees, are experiencing Advent "in an atmosphere of fragile hope," said Mgr Bashar Warda, archbishop of Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan where hundreds of thousands of people from Mosul and the Nineveh Plain found refuge in the summer of 2014, after fleeing the violence of the Islamic State.

Many, especially the refugees, "tend to identify with the Holy Family" of Nazareth, forced to live in a "difficult and challenging" context, away from their home and land. Although most no longer live in tents, many difficulties remain, especially for job seekers.

Mgr Warda said that for refugees the greatest desire "is going home to their towns and villages" to “start to rebuild a future." It is important, he said, to "keep this hope alive in them.”

For this reason, it is essential that Catholics in the West, in this period of preparation for Christmas, continue to "pray for us" and "keep telling our history and suffering to keep hope alive."

As a small token of this, the Archdiocese of Erbil celebrated the official opening of the first Catholic university in the city on the feast day of the Immaculate, 8 December.

For Mgr Warda, that is "a message of hope" for the Christian community and "a response by the Church to the exodus of thousands of young people." The university, the prelate said, is "a strong reason to stay" and a great "sign of hope".

A few days ago, on Sunday 13 December, the Holy Door was opened in St Joseph’s Cathedral in Ankawa’s Christian section. Indeed, to express even more the Church’s closeness to displaced families, the archbishop called on priests to open a door in all of the diocese’s churches – refugees can be found in all of them – so that everyone could have an opportunity to experience the event.

Currently, some 2,000 families have moved into trailers and prefabricated buildings after months in tents.

With his mind on the Year of Mercy, Mgr Warda said he was going to dedicate some prayers so that it might be an opportunity "to hear God’s word inviting us to rejoice in his mercy" for he "welcomes us and listens to refugees’ cry of pain." Indeed, God is great in his love because he gives us the "prayers and solidarity that many others have towards us."

In a pastoral letter, the prelate also expressed encouragement to "priests, nuns and the faithful to benefit from this blessed year first and foremost at a spiritual level."

"This [Jubilee] year not only impels us to perform acts of mercy towards others,” Mgr Warda said, “but it calls upon even more to receive God's mercy, undergo rebirth and accept God’s love in our personal journey." (DS)

• iraq
• kurdistan
• year
• mercy
• refugees