To Die Or To Leave

The Christians of Syria who are surrounded with despair and dangers are given two choices, both as awful: TO DIE OR TO LEAVE. 1. TO DIE:The fighting’s are becoming widespread and are spreading from cities to cities leaving lots of damage and desolation. These dangerous places bring death in many ways: a) Civilians are the main target of bombing and fires...Christians and Muslims… b) Car bomb can explode when walking by or near your house, workshop or school... c) Snipers are shooting on anything that moves: workers, schoolchildren, elders, ambulance drivers... d) Armed groups can abduct you and request a ransom..If you don’t pay, they will torture and kill you to set an example for the next “prey”. e) 223 hospitals are now closed, lack of care, doctors fleeing or lack of medical drugs increase the number of death. f) One can die of malnutrition or lack of adequate food for the diabetic, heart conditions or lack of baby food/milk. 2) TO LEAVE: Leaving is a different kind of death... Leaving one's country, house, church, friends, school, cemetery... it means slowly dying…Pulling a man from its roots is like taking the fish out of the water...the body will live elsewhere...but the soul will never forget its birth land... Many are coming to church asking for protection or help to find a visa to leave. Although fragile, the Syrian church becomes a wailing wall… Since 2005, those poor Christians witnessed the UN send Iraqi refugees to welcoming western countries…Their anguish is greater when they see the disinterest and global silence for their long and heavy suffering. They are abandoned, destined to die without being given the choice of leaving… Consulates have been closed for one and half year… The Syrian refugees are already five millions, almost one in four Syrians have been forced to leave their home, sometimes two or three times due to fighting spreading where they go. There is almost no help to most... a. THE VOICELESS LAMB: Those poor Christians, who don't see any reason to die for this nonsense war, witnessed their richer peers leave Syria, the medium class is left watching a church surviving with a life buoy. The call from the new pope Francis at Easter for the beloved Syria rings in our hearts… The sister churches of the whole world are praying and they cherish this small herd without being able to appease the storm. We are facing a grave moral issue: suggesting them to stay can lead them to death like the sheep to the slaughter (Ac 8, 32) during which time our martyrdom only gets longer…Helping them leave means emptying this biblical land of the last Christians.Many questions are coming to mind and will find answers only in God's Heart. How can we comfort and support the faithful? If not by the pastoral presence among locals to give shape to the Lord's command which never disappoints: "FEAR NOT... I AM WITH YOU..." Mt. 28 April 2013. +Samir NASSAR Maronite Archbishop of Damascus