Lebanon: a generator of salvation for man and the common home arrives

Cecilia Seppia – Vatican City

Thirty kilometers north of Beirut, in Lebanon, far from the chaos of the capital, stands the Mar Nohra Monastery of the Maronite Antonian Order. A place of worship, abandoned for centuries and then renovated a few years ago, whose walls exude history and spirituality, and where the monastic community, now stable and fertile in new vocations, lives in perpetual harmony with Creation. Mar Nohra, near the better known shrine of Our Lady of Harissa, dominates the surrounding landscape from a hill of 600 meters and extends, looking at the Mediterranean Sea, over a land of 23 hectares completely covered with oaks, pines and cedars, with a cultivated as a vegetable garden. Many animals have found their habitat here and spend their days undisturbed next to humans. Seeing it like this, it would seem like a happy and above all “green” oasis, but every medal has its reverse; this monastery is also suffering the effects of the heavy economic crisis which, since 2019, has hit the country. In the year preceding the Covid-19 pandemic, the Lebanese currency lost more than 90% of its purchase value. The economic collapse – one of the worst in the world since 1850 – resulting from political instability and perennial conflicts, has reduced about four million families to poverty. And as the economy crashes, the prices of basic necessities skyrocket, due to 138% inflation, so more and more people are faced with the choice between paying rent or buying food, water and medicines to live on. The local Caritas is crowded by the so-called “new poor”: Lebanese workers belonging to the upper-middle class and often you come across teachers or doctors intent on rummaging in the garbage. Among other drastic measures, the government has opted for the rationing of gas, electricity and in some places even drinking water, allowing the population only one hour of electricity a day.

Mar Nohra Monastery exterior

Continue the mission

Even the Monastery suffers from this condition and the friars are forced to buy electricity from the private managers of the current generators who, however, now have to deal with the lack of diesel and the exorbitant increase in its cost on the market, as well as with the maintenance costs of the machines themselves. Hence the idea of ​​turning towards renewable energies and carrying out an energy efficiency project for the entire structure, using solar panels and new generation boilers. “Work has already begun and seems to be progressing well”, Father Maged Maroun, general attorney of the Antonian Maronite Order (OAM) at the Holy See and rector of the College of Sant’Isaiah told Vatican News and L’Osservatore Romano. The Order’s treasurer has in fact decided to cover 10 percent of the costs of the project, while the bulk of the funding has been taken over by the Roaco (Meeting of Works for the Help of Oriental Churches), an organization headed by the same Dicastery. “I spent the last two weeks in Lebanon and spent a few days at the Mar Nohra Monastery – continues Father Maroun – and I was able to see with my own eyes that it is impossible to go on like this. For everyone, for people who don’t make ends meet, for future generations, and also for the friars. The idea for this project was born for several reasons. First, to guarantee the mission of the monastery itself: I am referring to the religious mission but also the pastoral and educational one. Currently, in fact, the monastery welcomes both student monks during the year of diaconate, and lay people for spiritual retreats or formation cohabitations. And then there is an important school of iconography. You know that in the East iconography, icons, the writing of icons, the theology that underlies iconographic art and the spirituality linked to them are really very important; in addition, the monks are dedicated to the education and training of young people to pass on to them the ancient and religious baggage of this country and of being Christian. Finally they have an agricultural activity, they cultivate land independently and feed themselves, according to an equally ancient practice, with the work of their hands. The monastery cannot live without water and electricity, therefore, given the drastic rationing implemented by the State, we have thought of an alternative energy, to survive us and to make the people who come to us to ask for help, to learn, feel better. to pray, we want to put into operation a ‘generator of salvation’ for man and the environment and the choice of renewables is the only one possible as well as a duty, also because here if there is one thing that is almost never lacking , as there is a predominantly Mediterranean climate, it is the light of the sun”.

The ancient monastery of Mar Nohra, a glimpse of the renovated building

Live in connection

The attorney general of the OAM reflects on the help that the Church is giving in this context of grave crisis and adds: “the Church has always been, following the social doctrine, at the side of the people, and it is spiritually but also materially. Furthermore, in recent times, listening to the will of Pope Francis, clearly expressed in the Laudato si’ and in Brothers all, we are getting even closer and we are committing ourselves to issues such as the environment, which are no longer negligible. We have all understood the importance of finding an energy that does not pollute, that does not damage the planet but rather can improve the quality of life and respect for our common home. In addition to local churches and monasteries, public and private schools and universities are also trying to obtain funds and means to produce clean and therefore sustainable energy”. As Christians, says Father Maroun, we cannot neglect the good and care of man in his totality: “I am speaking of mental, spiritual but also material well-being, of his health and today more than ever we are convinced that man can be good only in connection with Creation, with the House that God has granted him to inhabit and with all the other animal and vegetable species. It is the idea of ​​Pope Francis and also of all the social doctrine of the Church. There is no respect for man without respect for the Earth. For 300 years, our monks have been trying to spread this culture which does not only benefit Christians but is for the good of all. The Pope calls all men of good will. We must all breathe fresh air, drink uncontaminated water, wash, eat and live with dignity. We all need a healthy environment, and if we continue to destroy or plunder nature, it will take its toll on us. We see it with earthquakes, with natural disasters, we have seen it with the pandemic. Therefore we continue a life, a monastic religious culture in this teaching, strengthened by the words of the Pope”.

The mission of the monks

Solidarity and subsidiarity

Reversing the course, focusing on another lifestyle, educating the alliance between humanity and the environment, preaching and implementing ecological conversion, encouraging creativity and the power of technology, the principle of the common good, are all topics of the Laudato si’ that emerge in this initiative of the monks. But other important themes mentioned in Francis’ encyclical are solidarity and subsidiarity and Father Maroun insists on the latter concept and on the idea that everyone should have the possibility of assuming their own responsibility in the healing processes of the society of which it belongs. That is why the friars were happy to welcome this energy efficiency project financed by the Maronite Order and mostly by Roaco, a charity headed by the Dicastery for the Eastern Churchesand that’s why those who have the ability to help can’t back down.

Together to rewrite the future

During a general audience on 23 September 2020, the Pope said this: “To emerge better from a crisis, the principle of subsidiarity must be implemented, respecting the autonomy and capacity for initiative of all, especially the least. All parts of a body are necessary and, as St. Paul says, those parts that might seem weaker and less important are actually the most necessary. In the light of this image, we can say that the principle of subsidiarity allows everyone to assume their role for the care and destiny of society. Implementing it, implementing the principle of subsidiarity gives hope, gives hope for a healthier and more just future; and we build this future together, aspiring to greater things, broadening our horizons. Either together or it doesn’t work. Either we work together to get out of the crisis, at all levels of society, or we will never get out of it. Getting out of the crisis doesn’t mean giving a lick of paint to current situations to make them seem a little more just. Getting out of the crisis means changing, and everyone makes real change, all the people who make up the people. All professions, all. And all together, all in community. If they don’t all do it, the result will be negative.” A ‘little piece of the future’ is therefore being written in Mar Nohra to alleviate the distrust, frustration and fatigue that all the Lebanese have been experiencing for a long, too long time.