“Planning and implementing a suicide attack by taking their children with them is a new” form “of violence. It is a family tragedy,” decries Msgr. Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo, Arch-bishop of Jakarta and President of the Indonesian Bishops’ Con-ference (Kwi).

He was commenting on the dynamics of the attacks that have hit three churches in Surabaya, capital of the province of East Java two days ago. Meanwhile, following the death of Nathanael, an eight-year-old Catholic child, the number of victims of the co-ordinated attack has risen to 12.

The terrorists belonged to a single terrorist family. The father, Dita Oeprianto, is the Pentecostal Church bomber (Gpps), while the two teenage sons carried out the attack on the Catholic Church of Saint Mary Immaculate (Smtb), aboard a motorcycle. The mother and her two small daughters, aged nine and 12, carried out the suicide attack at the Christian Church of Indonesia (Gki).

“I am convinced – says Msgr. Suharyo – that the two young daughters had no idea what would happen. This is incomprehensible and I think this kind of thing should never happen again, clouding our humanity.”