New Catholic university a beacon of hope for depleted Christian community in Iraq

The advance of Isis stopped just shy of the ancient city of Erbil and the struggle for the local area has seen thousands of Christians leave for the relative safety of Iraqi Kurdistan and beyond.

But now a new Catholic university has been opened in the city and serves as a message of hope for a Christian community that many are reporting as all but eradicated.

Archbishop Bashar Matti Warda, the Chaldean Catholic Archbishop of Erbil, said that it is hoped that the university will give Christians a good reason to stay in a region that has seen an exodus of the faithful.

"Our beloved Christian community has so many reasons to leave Iraq today, Archbishop Warda said at the opening of the university last week. "This is why this university is a strong motive to stay. We all have a great responsibility to give them reasons to stay. 

"The university is a message to those who want us thrown out of the circle of history. It means we are staying because we are deeply rooted in this soil for thousands of years."

The new university's programmes will include oriental studies, information technology, languages and economics. There will be about 96 courses available in biblical and theological studies, it was reported in Independent Catholic News.

Plans are in the works for a faculty of law and international relations.

Archbishop Warda added: "The University will be open to everyone, I hope that all the students - Christians, Muslims, Yazidis - will be able to breathe the Catholic faith and its fundamental values, we expect to receive up to 300 students each year". 

The foundation stone of the University was laid three years ago in the suburb of Erbil where the population is mainly Christian. The local Chaldean Church made available 30,000 square metres of land for the university campus.

The goal from the outset was to create a private centre of university studies open to all, in touch with the demands of the market and closely associated with scientific research. 

After almost three years, and the convulsions which overwhelmed the northern regions of Iraq and brought precisely to Ankawa thousands of Christians fleeing jihadist militia of the so called Islamic State, the University intends to stand as a tangible sign of help for Iraqi Christians, inevitably tempted to leave the country and put behind them the horrors of war and the uncertainty and threats weighing on the future.

Mgr Nunzio Galantino, secretary general of the Italian Bishops' Conference was visiting the campus after the Bishops of Rome Council supported the university by donating about £1.7m for the project. 

"The University will lay the foundation of a new history and a promising future," Mgr Galantino said at the opening.