After a silence which lasted 17 centuries, the
bells in a Christian church in the holy city of Najaf, in Iraq, have
sounded once again.
Saudi satellite television company Al Arabiya
reported on this special event today.
The ancient site of worship,
located inside the “Abdal Massih” (from the Arabic “Servant of God”)
convent, is in Al-Hirah, an ancient Christian city recently discovered
near Najaf.
The Arab television company said Pope Benedict XVI
sent Apostolic Nuncio Mgr. Giorgio Lingua as his envoy to the Middle
East.
A large delegation of Christian priests and bishops attended the
religious ceremony, including Armenian Catholic bishop Emmanuel
Dabbaghian and Raad Kachachi, head of the government bureau for Christians
and other religions.
The delegation was received by the highest
religious authority in Shi’ite Islam, the great Ayatollah Ali al
Sistani.
During the meeting, Christians and Muslims were
eager to stress that the former two are an integral and ancient part of
Iraq’s social fabric.
In a statement broadcast on Al Arabiya’s website, Mgr. Lingua said “the aim of the visit to Najaf was to visit Christian sites that were discovered in that city.”
In answer to a question about the special event
which is seen as evidence of the peaceful co-existence of religions, the
director of the Department of Antiquities in Najaf, Mohammed Hadi al
Maiyali, stated that Al-Hirah was once the Vatican of Christian
antiquities so it is not surprising that over 33 convents, places of
worship and churches were discovered by archaeologists in Najaf soil.
Al-Hirah was an important urban centre during the
pre-Islamic Arab era. Originally a military camp (hirta), it became the
capital of the Arab Lakhmidi dynasty in the 5th and 6th centuries.
According to historian Hassan al Hakim, in the fourth century after
Christ, the city was Christian or strongly influenced by Christianity:
and this was because in 420 AD, al-Numaan al-Mundhir I, Lakhmid prince
of Al-Hirah had embraced the Christian faith.