The head of the Syriac Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic church in full communion with the Holy See, celebrated the sacred liturgy in a Baghdad parish on February 8 and encouraged the beleaguered Christian community to stay in the Middle East.

Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Yonan of Antioch thanked his “little flock” for remaining faithful to the Gospel and compared those who remained in the Middle East to leaven. He encouraged those who are deciding whether to emigrate to ask themselves whether they are seeking an earthly kingdom or a heavenly one, and to ponder Christ’s words in the Sermon on the Mount: “do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth.”

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