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ALL FAITHS WELCOME FOR GENOCIDE SERVICE AT ARMENIAN CHURCH IN CHELMSFORD
By Debbie Hovanasian
Lowell Sun
April 23, 2012 Monday
Massachusetts
CHELMSFORD -- Next weekend, inside an Orthodox church on Old Westford
Road, something rare will occur.
Muslims, Jews, Orthodox Christians, Catholics, Protestants,
non-denominational Christians and Buddhists will stand side by side
in song and prayer.
Any differences in their religious beliefs and rituals will take a
back seat to a common thread -- lifting their unified voices against
all genocides, past, present and future.
The Greater Lowell Interfaith Leadership Alliance and the host Sts.
Vartanantz Armenian Church invite all to join them in prayer, healing
and action at their second annual Interfaith Service against Genocide
on Sunday, beginning at 4 p.m., in the sanctuary of Sts. Vartanantz,
at 180 Old Westford Road.
"Our purpose is not to point fingers or single out perpetrators,"
said Farook Taufig of the Islamic Center of Greater Lowell and GLILA
co-president. "Our focus is on the victims and what happened to them."
Before the service, a 2005 documentary on the Armenian Genocide, which
marks its 97th anniversary tomorrow, will be shown beginning at 3 p.m.
According to Ara Jeknavorian, deacon at Sts. Vartanantz, the optional
film assumes limited knowledge of the Armenian Genocide, which took
place within the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923.
About 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children lost their
ancestral land, homes and lives after being marched by Ottoman
Turks into deserts and elsewhere. They were starved, exhausted and
brutalized to death. Some succumbed to the elements or epidemics in
concentration camps.
Armenia was the first nation to adopt Christianity as its state
religion, tracing its Christian roots back to the first-century
missions of the apostles Bartholomew and Thaddaeus.
Many Armenians credit that devout Christian faith, a minority religion
in the Turkish Ottoman Empire, for helping the Armenian people to
survive and eventually thrive after the eight-year genocide in Asia
Minor and historic Armenia.
With such a strong connection between genocide survival and the
deep-rooted faith of the Armenians, Jeknavorian said he welcomes the
opportunity to open the doors of the exquisite sanctuary Sunday so
people of all faiths may unite in prayer against genocide.
"This is an opportunity for many firsts," said Jeknavorian, whose
parents, Abraham and Flora, survived the genocide by fleeing to America
and settling in Lowell. "It is a time for being relaxed and open. I,
and probably the world, surely won't fall apart."
"Probably the opposite," responded Rabbi Dawn Rose of Lowell's Temple
Emanuel of the Merrimack Valley and chairperson of the GLILA Genocide
Project Committee.
GLILA members point out that this year's service has great healing
potential, especially in light of the controversy surrounding the
Turkish government's refusal to acknowledge the word "genocide"
for the Armenian casualties.
Taufig has already extended an invitation to the service to the Islamic
community in Methuen, which is primarily Turkish. Should they decide
to come, it would be "huge," he said.
The Rev. Imogene Stulken, Protestant campus minister at UMass Lowell,
recently discussed the interfaith service with a student of Turkish
descent. The student wondered if she would be welcomed and added that
her generation needs to talk, Stulken said.
Jeknavorian said the student would be welcomed, "100 percent."
During the service, guests will be welcomed by members of GLILA
and the Rev. Khachatur Kesablyan, pastor of Sts. Vartanantz. Rabbi
Rose and Stephen Fisher of Healing Springs Counseling will present
a historical litany of genocides, of which there have been several
dozen over 2,000 years.
Presenters for various genocides include Franco Majok on Rwanda;
Niem Nay-Kret and Ven. Sao Khon, president of the Community of Khmer
Buddhist Monks, on Cambodia; Rabbi Rose, with congregants from Temple
Emanuel, on the Holocaust; Rev. Ryuoh Faulconer, Shonin, Nichiren
Buddhist Sanghe of Greater New England on Japan; and Rev. Kesablyan
on the Armenian Genocide.
Responses will be sung in English and Armenian. Jeknavorian said he
will teach a short Armenian chant.
After the service, all attendees will walk to the church's poignant
Memorial to the Armenian Martyrs of 1915, designed to symbolize the
Armenian family coming home to its holy church. Resting on the design
of the Armenian cross, names of survivors and victims are engraved
in the memorial.
Attendees will have an opportunity to lay a carnation at the memorial
before the event ends with Armenian food, pastries and egg rolls made
by the Cambodian members, Rose said. Action and information tables
will be set up in the hall.
"I'm not sure there is another place where open expression of grief
of so many cultures come together in the context of healing," Rabbi
Rose said. "It's really important for each group to see the grief
and struggle of other groups. It proves that genocide is not just
what happened to the Jews -- and that it is still happening today."
By Debbie Hovanasian
Lowell Sun
April 23, 2012 Monday
Massachusetts
CHELMSFORD -- Next weekend, inside an Orthodox church on Old Westford
Road, something rare will occur.
Muslims, Jews, Orthodox Christians, Catholics, Protestants,
non-denominational Christians and Buddhists will stand side by side
in song and prayer.
Any differences in their religious beliefs and rituals will take a
back seat to a common thread -- lifting their unified voices against
all genocides, past, present and future.
The Greater Lowell Interfaith Leadership Alliance and the host Sts.
Vartanantz Armenian Church invite all to join them in prayer, healing
and action at their second annual Interfaith Service against Genocide
on Sunday, beginning at 4 p.m., in the sanctuary of Sts. Vartanantz,
at 180 Old Westford Road.
"Our purpose is not to point fingers or single out perpetrators,"
said Farook Taufig of the Islamic Center of Greater Lowell and GLILA
co-president. "Our focus is on the victims and what happened to them."
Before the service, a 2005 documentary on the Armenian Genocide, which
marks its 97th anniversary tomorrow, will be shown beginning at 3 p.m.
According to Ara Jeknavorian, deacon at Sts. Vartanantz, the optional
film assumes limited knowledge of the Armenian Genocide, which took
place within the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923.
About 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children lost their
ancestral land, homes and lives after being marched by Ottoman
Turks into deserts and elsewhere. They were starved, exhausted and
brutalized to death. Some succumbed to the elements or epidemics in
concentration camps.
Armenia was the first nation to adopt Christianity as its state
religion, tracing its Christian roots back to the first-century
missions of the apostles Bartholomew and Thaddaeus.
Many Armenians credit that devout Christian faith, a minority religion
in the Turkish Ottoman Empire, for helping the Armenian people to
survive and eventually thrive after the eight-year genocide in Asia
Minor and historic Armenia.
With such a strong connection between genocide survival and the
deep-rooted faith of the Armenians, Jeknavorian said he welcomes the
opportunity to open the doors of the exquisite sanctuary Sunday so
people of all faiths may unite in prayer against genocide.
"This is an opportunity for many firsts," said Jeknavorian, whose
parents, Abraham and Flora, survived the genocide by fleeing to America
and settling in Lowell. "It is a time for being relaxed and open. I,
and probably the world, surely won't fall apart."
"Probably the opposite," responded Rabbi Dawn Rose of Lowell's Temple
Emanuel of the Merrimack Valley and chairperson of the GLILA Genocide
Project Committee.
GLILA members point out that this year's service has great healing
potential, especially in light of the controversy surrounding the
Turkish government's refusal to acknowledge the word "genocide"
for the Armenian casualties.
Taufig has already extended an invitation to the service to the Islamic
community in Methuen, which is primarily Turkish. Should they decide
to come, it would be "huge," he said.
The Rev. Imogene Stulken, Protestant campus minister at UMass Lowell,
recently discussed the interfaith service with a student of Turkish
descent. The student wondered if she would be welcomed and added that
her generation needs to talk, Stulken said.
Jeknavorian said the student would be welcomed, "100 percent."
During the service, guests will be welcomed by members of GLILA
and the Rev. Khachatur Kesablyan, pastor of Sts. Vartanantz. Rabbi
Rose and Stephen Fisher of Healing Springs Counseling will present
a historical litany of genocides, of which there have been several
dozen over 2,000 years.
Presenters for various genocides include Franco Majok on Rwanda;
Niem Nay-Kret and Ven. Sao Khon, president of the Community of Khmer
Buddhist Monks, on Cambodia; Rabbi Rose, with congregants from Temple
Emanuel, on the Holocaust; Rev. Ryuoh Faulconer, Shonin, Nichiren
Buddhist Sanghe of Greater New England on Japan; and Rev. Kesablyan
on the Armenian Genocide.
Responses will be sung in English and Armenian. Jeknavorian said he
will teach a short Armenian chant.
After the service, all attendees will walk to the church's poignant
Memorial to the Armenian Martyrs of 1915, designed to symbolize the
Armenian family coming home to its holy church. Resting on the design
of the Armenian cross, names of survivors and victims are engraved
in the memorial.
Attendees will have an opportunity to lay a carnation at the memorial
before the event ends with Armenian food, pastries and egg rolls made
by the Cambodian members, Rose said. Action and information tables
will be set up in the hall.
"I'm not sure there is another place where open expression of grief
of so many cultures come together in the context of healing," Rabbi
Rose said. "It's really important for each group to see the grief
and struggle of other groups. It proves that genocide is not just
what happened to the Jews -- and that it is still happening today."