Syriac Catholic Patriarch raps Western indifference toward displaced Iraqi Christians
December 04, 2014
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The leader of the Syriac Catholic Church has charged that Western governments are neglecting the Christian refugees of Iraq because they have no economic incentives to help them.
Patriarch Joseph III Younan of Antioch told Aid to the Church in Need that the West ignores Iraqi Christians because they “have neither the numbers nor the riches to make them attractive.” He expressed dismay that when he sought to find support of the Iraqi Christians driven from their homes, “the supposedly civilized Western world is rather silent.”
“We are refugees in our own country,” the Syriac Patriarch said. Morale is low, he said, among the Christians who have been driven from their homes and now face the likelihood that they will never be able to return. He estimated that 140,000 Christians are now displaced, and said that Church in Iraq does not have the means to care for their needs in terms of food, housing, medical care, and education.
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Posted by: Minnesota Mary -
Dec. 04, 2014 5:32 PM ET USA
Of course we're silent. It is because of our foreign policy and war making that these Christians are suffering persecutions. No one wants to acknowledge this because they might feel the discomfort of guilt. Our political leaders will be allocating money for more wars but not for humanitarian relief for these poor Christians. The silence of our politicians is deafening.
