With deep regret, we
announce the passing away of
Bishop Andreas Abouna,
Bishop of the Patriarch of
Baghdad of the Chaldeans.
May he rest in peace.
Bishop Andreas Abouna was 67
and had suffered from a
kidney problem.
He underwent kidney surgery
two months ago. He seemed to
have recovered, however he
had a relapse last week and
was admitted to the hospital
on Monday 26th July. He died in
Erbil, Iraq. Funeral was
held at Saint Joseph’s
Cathedral in Ankawa, near
Erbil.
He was born on 23rd March
1943 in the village of Bedar,
outside the northern Iraqi
town of Zakho. At the age of
14, he joined Saint Peter’s
Seminary, northern city of
Mosul. He was ordained a
priest for the Chaldean
Catholic Church on 5th June
1966.
He became a parish priest in
the diocese of Basra in
southern Iraq from 1967.
In 1971 he was appointed
parish priest of Saint
Joseph the Worker’s Church,
Baghdad, where he served for
20 years. In 1989 he became
personal secretary to
Chaldean Catholic leader
Patriarch Raphael I Bidawid
of Baghdad.
In 1991 became priest in
charge of the Chaldean and
Syrian-Catholic Mission,
Ealing, West London, where
he stayed for 11 years.
On 11th November 2002 he was
named Auxiliary Bishop of
Baghdad and he returned to
Iraq. He was ordained a
bishop by Pope John Paul II,
St Peter's, Rome, 6 January
2004.
Any
donation you
can make will be gratefully
received.
Christianity became rooted in Iraq from
the first Christian centuries.
The
Christian community of Iraq has
been an important part of the fabric of
Iraqi society at all times.
They made
substantial contributions to the
emergence of the Abbasid civilization
that flourished on Iraqi soil as well as
the building of modern Iraq. They have
always been proud of their country in
which they lived from ancient times and
to which they are attached by bonds of
history that go back to the Assyrians
and the Babylonians.