A historic moment in Erbil, northern Iraq. In Ankawa, a suburb of the capital city of Iraqi Kurdistan located in the north of the country, hundreds of Christians are participating in the Feast of the Cross, which began on Monday 9 September and will continue until Friday. The joyous event is marked by high hopes given that the Christians of various traditions are coming together for the celebration – Catholic, Orthodox and Assyrian – the first time united together in celebrating the memory of the finding of the Holy Cross on which our Lord died for the redemption of all.
The focus of the celebrations underscores the faith that unites Christians. They are praying every day in a different church and participating in the various cultural meetings organised in the streets of the suburb, made festive with special lights and colours. All the events are part of the preparations for the liturgical Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, which will take place on 14 September for churches following the Gregorian calendar or 27 September for those following the Julian calendar.
At the opening of the festivities on Monday 9 September, a large cross was carried in procession to the Assyrian Church of the East of St. John the Baptist. The solemnity of the celebration was reflected in the hymns sung by the clergy and faithful holding large lit candles, a sign not only of praise and adoration but also of sharing and peace. “Churches used to celebrate this commemoration separately every year. But this year is wonderfully different,” underscored Monsignor Bashar Matti Warda, arch-parish priest of the Chaldean Catholic Diocese of Erbil, who organised the event with the blessing of Mar Awa III, Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East, and the Bishops of the Syro-Catholic and Syro-Orthodox Churches.
In his address during the festival, Patriarch Mar Awa III explained how “the celebration of the Feast of the Finding of the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ represents an important milestone in the divine plan in the Church of the East. When we look at the cross, we remember the sufferings of Christ, but also his glorious resurrection from the dead. And when we make the sign of the cross over ourselves, we proclaim our expectation of his Second Advent and our faith in eternal life.”
The celebrations of the Feast of the Holy Cross represent a further and concrete step in ecumenism to which the Catholic Church attaches great importance, as Pope Francis affirmed in his Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium: “commitment to ecumenism responds to the prayer of the Lord Jesus that ‘they may all be one.’”
The events also represent a positive sign for the future of Iraqi Christians: over time, wars, political instability and the rise of the Islamic State have driven thousands of Christians of all denominations out of the country. Just some time ago, Monsignor Bashar Matti Warda himself, in the absence of official statistics, declared that “in all of Iraq there are around 300,000 Christians remaining.” But hope remains alive despite the reduced numbers of this flock, as the Ankawa festival is proving.