Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, rejoice! With God’s help we are well – thank God. I would like to report a few things from our mission here in Indonesia.
- From December 28 to 31, 2009 I visited our community in Tarutung, and I met Fr. Athanasius and we toured our communities at the Resurrection of Christ in Shiparvoe village, St. Eudocia in Haousisada-sada and St. Nicholas in Haugandang village. Late in the evening of December 31, 2009 I arrived in Medan because I will be celebrating mass at St. Demetrius Medan on New Year’s Day.
- I celebrated the Divine Liturgy of Great Basil and New Year’s Day at the Holy Monastery of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary in Medan. After the Divine Liturgy, we cut our Christmas cake and ate together outside Sister Agni’s cell, because the monastery does not yet have a monastery tavern like every other monastery in Greece. We praise the Most Merciful God because He has merited us to enter the blessed new year 2010. We returned home from the monastery late in the afternoon.
- On January 6, 2010 we celebrated the Divine Liturgy and the Great Consecration. At the end we celebrated the group baptism of the 7 catechumens. Of the 7 catechumens, 4 were from our Theological School students, who came to our faith knowing well what Orthodoxy is. Our theological faculty is like soil that deserves to be cultivated well, so that more young people will come to our faith.
- On January 7, 2010 we celebrated the Christmas event of the St. Demetrius Medan Church. We organized this event with the 53 students of our boarding schools (St. Dimitrios 15 boys, St. Nicholas 20 boys and St. Anna 28 girls). We rented three houses for these poor students to live near our theological school to avoid the fare. They stay in our boarding houses for free.
- Faculty of Theology. On January 8, 2010 the students of the Apostle Paulus Medan School of Theology celebrated the Christmas event in the courtyard of the School. We held this event in the courtyard of the School because we do not have a hall large enough to accommodate the 350 students and guests. At the end of the event we had lunch together in the School hall.
- From 11-15 January 2010 Father Athanasios from Tarutung and I from Medan went down to Nias. Our purpose is to see first hand the works of the mission there. Two days we were in Gunung Sitoli where our St. Nicholas School is located.
- Still on the island of Nias, on January 13, 2010 at 5 am, Fr. Athanasios and I along with some of the faithful in a rented cart departed to the village of Bawalato to minister there. We traveled 2 hours with the cart and then left it on the side of the road because it cannot enter the village. We then walked for an extra hour to reach the mountain that the village finds itself on. All drenched in sweat, we arrived at St. Catherine’s Church at 8.10am and immediately began the Scouting. Then we celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the local language. At the end we ate together and in the late afternoon we returned to Gumung Sitoli. Now we are expected to go there again to celebrate the baptism of some catechumens and I plan to go down there after Easter in April 2010.
This is our news, my brothers and sisters, thank you once again for your great contribution and love for the Orthodox Mission and I always pray to the Most Merciful God to bless you with His rich goods. Thank you for your Christmas wishes.
π. Chrysostomos Manalou
