Brief report of Bishop Samuel Azariah, Mrs. Resha Qadir Bakhsh and Mr. Raheel Sharoon’s visit to churches in Europe.

NETHERLANDS (5-12 June 2010)

Saturday, 5th June, 2010
Arrival in Amsterdam, Netherlands and travel to Utrecht.

Sunday, 6th June, 2010
Attended Sunday Service at Dom Church PVN-Central Church of Utrecht city. The Dom Church is the biggest protestant church of Utrecht. Its building is almost 700 years old; it’s an old and large congregation. At the time of the service the church was almost full as it was a communion Sunday. The service was in Dutch but we enjoyed the beautiful hymns and music from the organ. After the service we met the congregation and presented a report of the Diocese’s work for handicapped children.

Monday, 7th June, 2010 to Friday, 11th June, 2010
Work started with discussion on the agenda of our stay in Netherlands. During the week we met numerous people from KerkinActie and discussed various issues. Mrs. Resha Qadir Bakhsh and Mr. Raheel Sharoon also visited two institutions for special children. This was a great opportunity to brief the people about our work at the Diocese of Raiwind and also about the general situation of Pakistan.

Sunday, 12th June, 2010
Attended Sunday Service in a church in HEERENVEEN which a city in the Northern side of Netherlands. It was a very active church where almost 450 people were present for the service. After the church service Documentary of the Diocese of Raiwind was presented was very enthusiastically viewed by the members.


SWITZERLAND (13 June 2010)

Arrival at Geneva.

During the two day stay we met different organizations working at the Ecumenical Center of the World Council of Churches. It was again an opportunity for us to brief people about the different ministries of the Diocese and also about the situation of Pakistan.

Bishop Azariah and Mrs. Resha Qadir Bakhsh after two days stay left for Oslo, Norway where they had meetings scheduled with Norwegian Churches. While Mr. Raheel Sharoon stayed at Geneva for a two day exposure at the UN Human Rights Council meeting and later for a week long internship at the Communications Department of the WCC.