This Syrian Archbishop Has a Message for the West Regarding Refugees... and It's Not What You Might Think...

Leah Marieann Klett : May 10, 2016
Gospel Herald

"We will reconstruct our country. We want to build and stay. We want it to be our country and stay in this country where Christianity was born, and give a testimony of Christ's love and charity, and of the possibility to live together, as men believing in God and respectful of one another." 

[Gospel Herald] A Syrian Catholic Archbishop serving in the city of Aleppo has urged the West to refrain from taking in any more refugees and instead put more effort into finding a solution to the devastating conflict. (Photo: Girls who survived what activists said was a ground-to-ground missile attack by forces of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad, hold hands at Aleppo's Bab al-Hadeed district April 7, 2015. REUTERS/Abdalrhman Ismail/via Gospel Herald)

When asked about Canada welcoming 25,000 Syrian refugees in the past few months during a recent trip to the country, Jean-Clement Jeanbart, Melkite Catholic Archbishop of Aleppo, said such efforts are simply hurting those already suffering. "We're not happy when we see the Canadian government moving refugees and facilitating their integration. It hurts us. A lot," he said, according to the World Watch Monitor.
 
Instead, the bishop said he wishes Syrians, especially Christians, would stay in their ancient lands: "They [the West] pity the Syrians and the Christians. But do they really know about their problems? No, I don't think so, because if they did, they would have made efforts to end this war, to prevent it from continuing," he said.

The report notes that since 2011, the Christian population in Syria has been reduced by two-thirds since the beginning of Syria's civil war, from 1.5 million to only 500,000 today. In the 8,000-year-old city of Aleppo, just a quarter of the Christian population remains.
 
"More than half the city's population left over the last four or five years," Jeanbart said. "It [Canada] has to help them stay where they are ... to find...
 
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