 29 Febbraio 2020FEBRUARY 2020 - Antioch News Flash (Glynn MacNiven)
The first weeks of February are always the coldest of the year here in Antioch and this year was no different. In fact the week of Valentine’s Day the temperature dropped to several degrees below zero and we even had some snow. But now the weather is turning quite mild.
8thFebruary Visit to our church by six officials from the Ministry of Tourism in Ankara.
9th February. After Sunday Mass, we have an early celebration of St Valentine – not for romance but because it is the name day of both Kristofer-Valentino and Fr. Domenico-Valentino…
14th February. Also in Turkey, Valentine's Day is celebrated, as "day dedicated to lovers" with flowers, gifts and dinners ... Fr.Domenico, baptized with the name of Valentino, was invited by the family who works in church for dinner in a restaurant!
17th February The first group of pilgrims (45) of 2020. They are from the diocese of Burga in Portugal and are accompanied by Fr. Paul.
18th February. Fr. Piero Vivoli, Bursar General, (right) and Fr. Alfredo Rava, Legal Representative of the Order, make a financial visit to our mission from our General Curia in Rome.
- Tonight sees the start of a series of catecheses leading to a serious, well-developed journey of faith. The catecheses will be twice a week until 5th April. The catechists are those of the first neo-catechumenal community of the parish.
24th February. Returning to Mersin, Fr. Hanry Leylek, who spent a few days in Antioch visiting his elderly mother.
26th February. This is the night Muslims mark the conception of Mohammed. (Kandil Regaip) The Mufti has used the occasion to invite the faithful to forgive and to accept forgiveness. This is a new language in Islam which has always preached ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’.
27th February. A team from the Dutch television station, NPO 2. NL, is making a documentary on St Peter. It is to be called - De Missie -The Mission). It starts in Palestine then comes to Antioch and ends in Rome, They took several shots of our church. They also really liked our book and asked for 3 (FREE) copies!!!
28th February. Secularisation is not a problem confined to the West. Muslim countries too are increasingly affected. The front page of this newspaper reports the decrease in marriages and increase in divorces. In the Hatay region alone (our region) divorce has increased by 8% in a year from 2524 in 2018 to 2912 in 2019. The number of marriages too has fallen from 12,091 in 2018 to 11,595 in 2019.
29th February. These days the situation in our region, which borders Syria, has become very tense. The Turkish army, which openly supports the opponents of Bashar Al Assad, moved to ‘clean up’ the last Isis stronghold around the city of Idlib and in doing so came into conflict with the Russian backed Syrian army. Thirty-three Turkish soldiers were killed and many others wounded and brought to hospitals here in Antakya (Antioch). A dramatic and dangerous escalation!!!
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