A thank you
Fr Cosme and the five seminarians |
As we just started to build the new house of the Major Seminary, I wanted to show you some views of the beginning of the construction! Nothing really artistic but at least we started, as I got the permission just 2 weeks ago, after 9 months!
You will remember all of us in your prayers.
Thanks again for the generosity of all the donors to our Major Seminary!
God bless you!
Bruno Cosme, MEP
Rector
St John Mary Vianney Major Seminary, Phnom Penh
A new future
Plans for the future |
The demolition of an old garage and store at the St John Mary Vianney Major Seminary in Phnom Penh, required a change of Government, many years of quiet progress and 9 months of waiting for the official approval of an architect’s plans. Foundations can now be laid. With five seminarians, more space is needed. After a lengthy bureaucratic delay, permission has been given to build eight extra bedrooms to accommodate future students and guests.
The seminary is on the very edge of the Killing Fields where more than 1,800 Khmer Rouge victims are buried. Even today scraps of clothing and pieces of human bones are regularly discovered on the surface of the soil. Within the seminary chapel, the Crucifix, in which a piece of bone has been inserted, remains as a precious relic of those who paid the ultimate price.
Building in progress |
After the fall of Pol Pot, the Church began to re-establish itself. Today the diocese of Phnom Penh has five seminarians, the greatest number in Cambodia’s 450 years of the country’s Catholic presence.
The new extension is being funded by Missio and the Society of St Peter the Apostle (SPA) in England and Wales, which also helps to support the seminarians and the priests. The SPA is helping to build a new future for the Church in Cambodia.
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