Aram I hosted former Lebanese president

YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 19, ARMENPRESS: His Holiness Catholicos Aram I hosted the former president of Lebanon Amine Pierre Gemayel. As Armenpress was reported by the Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia, the meeting held on September 18 was attended as well by the representative of the Armenian Parliamentary Bloc Hakob Bagratuni. During the advisory meeting the interlocutors discussed the issues related to Lebanon, Syria and the Middle East in general, as well as the challenges of the Christian communities in particular.

In Cilicia, the Catholicosate became the center of the Armenian life around which the religious, national, cultural, and educational activities were organized. After the Armenian Genocide (1915), the Catholicosate contributed significantly to the formation and organization of the Armenian Diaspora. During World War I (1915-1918), one and a half million Armenians were massacred by the Ottoman-Turkish government. In 1921, when the French forces evacuated Cilicia, a second wave of massacres ordered by Kemalist Turkey took the lives of another three hundred thousand Armenians. The rest of the Armenians were forced to leave their centuries-old homeland and found refuge mostly in Syria and Lebanon. The Catholicosate in Sis, as well thousands of Armenian churches, monasteries, schools and cultural centers were robbed and ruined by the Turks. Catholicos Sahak II followed his flock in exile. After wandering in Cyprus, Syria and Lebanon, in 1930, he established the Catholicosate in Antelias, Lebanon.

Thus, a new era of renaissance was opened in the history of the Catholicosate with the organization of dioceses and communities. The Armenian people spread all over the world looked at the Catholicosate with new hopes and expectations. In the course of time and in response to the growing needs of the Armenian communities and changing realities, the scope of the Church’s witness and service was broadened and its priorities were constantly revised. The survival of the Armenian people after the Genocide, which became the focus of the Church’s concern, was soon changed into community-building. The Catholicoi, Papken I, Bedros I, Karekin I, Zareh I, Khoren I and Karekin II, gave a new vitality to the mission of the Armenian Church. Besides the organization of theological and Christian education, the evangelistic witness, building of churches, schools, community centers, social institutions, and homes for elderly people became concrete expressions of the Church’s missionary outreach.

With the election of His Holiness Catholicos Aram I, a new period of dedicated service and dynamic witness begun in the history of the Armenian Church. In fact, the re-organization of the Theological Seminary, Birds’ Nest (orphanage), Sanatorium (hospital), Old People’s Home, the establishment of new departments on ecumenical relations, inter-religious dialogue, Christian education, youth, communication and information, Armenian studies, cultural activities, special courses for pastors, and initiation a number of processes and programs, conferences and seminars aimed at giving a renewed vitality and efficiency to the witness of the Church on inter-diocesan and pan-Armenian levels, clearly indicate the growing expansion of the Catholicosate’s mission of faith and the Church’s active presence in the life of our communities.

The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia has dioceses in the countries of the Middle East, in Europe and in North and South America. The diocesan prelates (Bishops or Archbishops) are elected by the Diocesan Council from the list of the candidates recommended by the Catholicos, and the election is confirmed by the Catholicos.