Excerpted from Tuesday’s remarks by Bashar Matti Warda, the archbishop of the Chaldean Diocese of Erbil, Iraq, to the General Synod of the Church of England.
Christianity in Iraq is going through one of its worst and hardest stages of its long history, which dates back to the first century.
Throughout all these long centuries, we have experienced many hardships and persecutions, offering caravans of martyrs.
Before World War II, we were victims of acts of genocide at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during the Massacre of Seifo in 1915 and the Massacre of Semele in 1933 at the hands of the Iraqi army.
During the Kurdish Uprising in 1961 and the Soriah Uprising in 1969, many of us were forcibly evicted from our villages and towns, and resettled in Baghdad and Mosul.
The acts of genocide and displacement continued after the regime change in 2003. They were crowned by the Massacre of the Church of Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad in 2010, with dozens of Christian worshipers killed in cold blood.
Yet 2014 brought the worst acts of genocide against us in our history. We now face the extinction of Christianity as a religion and as a culture from Mesopotamia [ancient Iraq].
In the past year, more than 125, 000 Christians have been forced to flee from their villages — merely because they chose to remain Christians and refused the conditions ISIS imposed.
They had to leave at night, under the cover of darkness. Many trod their own path of Golgotha for long hours, everything left behind but their clothes.
Arriving on foot, they sought refuge in relatively secure Kurdistan, having no idea if they would ever be able to return to life-long homes.
These brothers and sisters are designated as “displaced.” Only if they opt to cross an international border will they be classified as “refugees.”
All have been hearing sad news of the looting and destruction of their homes. And they realize full well that the military liberation of those areas is not the same as political liberation.
We believe the dear Lord will allow us to see the day that our villages are safe and secure, and on that day we will return to deserted and ruined houses, empty schools and hospitals.
As for our precious churches, it is heartbreaking for us to imagine what they will look like when we return. But we can rebuild.
For now, countless families are relying completely on the charity of others. A year ago, these same families were in their own homes and self-supporting. Now we pray in tents, having left behind ancient churches that lived the story of a flourishing Christianity.
Many have lost confidence; their homeland has rejected them and thrown them up. They have chosen to immigrate to the unknown, confident that they will be more secure.
Our friends and families are queued up, waiting for months and years in Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan for a chance to move again, maybe for the last time, to North America, Europe or Australia.
The real difference between the displaced and the refugees is that the refugees have made a final decision to get out. Even many “displaced” are only trying to save more money before they depart.
It is an understatement to say that we are in desperate need of financial and material support so that our families may stay and survive, or depart and survive.
For the Chaldean Church, and our sister churches of the East, the persecution our community is enduring is doubly painful and severe. Our vibrant church life is dissolving in front of our eyes. The mass immigration is leaving my church much weaker.
When the Jews were exiled to what is now called Iraq, they wrote, in text now enshrined in our Old Testament, of a yearning to return to their true home — Jerusalem.
My people, who resided so recently in the same land as the exiled chosen people, yearn for the opposite: They will go anywhere rather than return to their home.
We in the church hierarchy are tempted to encourage our parishioners to stay — to keep the presence of Christ alive in this special land.
But truly I and my brother bishops and priests can do no more than to advise young mothers and fathers to take all the necessary considerations into account and to pray long and hard before taking such a momentous, and perhaps perilous, decision.
The Church cannot offer the fundamental security that its members need to thrive.
We are hated because we persist in wanting to exist as Christians. That is, we are hated because we persist in demanding a basic human right.
I cannot repeat loudly enough that our survival as a people, as a historic community, is no longer in our hands. The future will come, one way or the other, and for us this means waiting to see what sort of aid (military, relief) arrives.
This talk is perhaps the most difficult one I have had to give. I have often spoken in front of audiences such as this, filled with kind and caring souls, but always to give warnings of what might happen, or to invite investment. No longer.
There are no more waves of refugees or displaced persons to come to Kurdistan. Mosul is empty of Christians; Basra is empty; Baghdad is virtually empty. We Christians do not have to plan against the worst anymore.