ishtartv.com - churchmilitant.com
by Alexander
Slavsky • March 9, 2018
The
head of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Baghdad has been named the recipient of
the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize for his work with persecuted Christians in
Iraq.
Primate
Mar Louis Raphael Sako told AsiaNews that receiving the price "is not
important" because it is the "symbolic value of the gesture"
that keeps "alive the focus on the Iraqi people, on the Christian
community ... for the future of the country."
L'Œuvre
d'Orient, a French Catholic association committed to helping persecuted
Christians, proposed his nomination in January which the Norwegian Nobel
Committee accepted. Sako's nomination received support from Christians and
Muslims in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and the world, especially in France where the
primate of the Iraqi Church has worked with Catholic and non-Catholic religious
leaders and nongovernmental organizations.
"It's
nice to see that even the Muslims have supported my candidacy," Sako commented. "In fact, I would say that they have done
it with greater vigor, and this is even more important. It represents a sign of
closeness and opens Iraq's doors to progress and democracy," said
Sako.
Last
week, the patriarch arranged an inter-faith meeting that included Muslims and Christians in
the Chaldean parish of St. Joseph in Karrada. These religious leaders
discussed religious extremism and its threat to the security of Iraq and its
people while offering solutions to ensure the safety of future
generations.
Sako
was installed as the Chaldean patriarch in 2013 where he has spoken out against
the exodus of Iraqi Christians, entreating the central government and local
authorities to help ensure a peaceful future in his country.
Archbishop
Yousif Thoma Mirkis of Kirkuk, Iraq, insisted
that "our hope is that [Sako's] candidacy will run its course and end
in a positive outcome."
Mirkis
noted that Sako's nomination represents
"a recognition not only for him personally but for all the
Christians of Iraq and the Middle East who, in the past few years, have fought
hard, stood firm and yet remained non-violent whilst seeking peace, human
rights, coexistence and development in the country."
His
Excellency explained this year's prize recipient remembers "the
martyrs of the Chaldean Church, people like [Abp. Paulos Faraj] Rahho [of
Mosul, Iraq] and others, priests and lay people, who sacrificed their lives for
their faith."
Since
the return of the first Iraqi Catholic family in 2017, Sako has been urging
Iraqi Christians to either remain in Iraq or return to keep the Faith alive in
the country, remarking, "a Christian community that was born in
these lands cannot organize exodus trips that will mark its
extinction."
The
patriarch observed in 2014 that "if the situation does not
change" for Christians in Iraq, "the whole world take
responsibility [for] a slow genocide of an entire component of Iraqi society
and its age-old culture. ISIS tries to erase all traces," said
Sako.
Sako's
nomination for the prize according to
Mirkis "highlight[s] the sacrifices of an ancient community that
chose to remain in its own land despite persecution, the latest being that
of Daesh (Islamic State) which forced hundreds of thousands of families to
flee, convert or be killed."
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