Michigan, USA – Chaldeans don’t always have much time to spare.  Long hours at work, family and cultural responsibilities, and trying to make ends meet leaves many Chaldeans hungry for safe and entertaining events for the entire family. 

The Chaldean churches have had a long tradition in hosting family gatherings.  The opportunity brings respectful families together in faith and fellowship and helps raise funds to keep the church ministry strong.  

The events are always a community affair organized and managed by church volunteers and supported by community donors.  Although increasing competition of commercial festivals and state fairs targeting Chaldeans are on the rise, Chaldean church hosted events remain the number one place for Chaldean families. 

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Your church and community needs help.  This is a community call for volunteers for the 2nd Annual Mother of God Church Chaldean Music Festival.  The festival will be held on Saturday, August 23 & Sunday, August 24 at St. George Camp Chaldean located on 1391 Kellogg Road, Brighton, MI 48114.

The two day carnival event will feature carnival games, 9 live bands, food, vendor and information booths, contests, and more.  Volunteers that are 18 years of age and older are needed to make this event a success.  Community volunteers will receive room accommodations, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and volunteer shirts. 

We need help with assisting crowds, controlling the rides, working the carnival tents, parking, security, serving food, donating items to the prize and give-away table, and keeping the area clean. 

To answer the call for help please contact Steve Sitto at cmf@chaldean.org / (248) 762-4424 or Raad Kashat at MotherofGodChurch@yahoo.com. 

 The fertile lands in the river basins of Euphrates and Tigris were the home land of rich and complex societies.   The word 'Mesopotamia' is Greek meaning ‘land between the rivers’ derived from Greek mesos (middle) and potamos (river), thus 'land between the rivers'.

Flowing south out of Turkey, the Tigris and Euphrates are 250 miles apart.  The Euphrates runs south and east for 800 miles and the Tigris flows south for 550 miles. The two rivers join and stretch to the Persian Gulf as the Shatt al Arab.  The area that now comprises most all of modern Iraq and part of Syria. 

Mesopotamia's richness attracted neighbors and its history is a pattern of infiltration and invasion. Although there were meager rainfalls in most of the region, the land was well irrigated by canals.  The fertile soil yielded rich food and heavy crops of date palms, useful fiber, wood, and fodder. Both rivers have fish, and the southern marshes contain wildfowl.    Being a land of plenty, commerce, and strategic worth the river valleys and plains of Mesopotamia were often attacked from the rivers, the northern and eastern hills, the Arabian Desert, and Syrian plains. 

Most of the conflicts were internal to the region and small skirmishes between warring tribes and factions.  It was not until Persia (Iran) invaded and defeated the Chaldeans, the last rulers of the region, that the area is forever lost to foreigners. 

Michigan, USA - No one would dare refute that Chaldeans often come from large families.  The Chaldean culture values the importance of family virtues and cooperation.   Chaldeans often hold large family gatherings, dinners, and celebrations.  

One family is taking the family gathering up a few notches.  The Yaldo(o|u) family is hosting their 2008 family reunion at Camp Chaldean in Michigan beginning at 1 p.m. on Sunday, July 27.  Nearly a thousand family members are expected to attend the family gathering. 

Saher Yaldo, a leading community entrepreneur and committed volunteer for the Chaldean Voice radio station has been instrumental in the reunion.  “We invite everyone with Yaldo(o|u) blood pulsing through their veins.  This includes all children and grandchildren whose mother or father are Yaldo(o|u), says Saher.

“Guests are also welcome to invite close friends and relatives as well. We will be holding a special Mass for all our guests led by Fr. Basel Yaldo of St. George Church at 4 p.m. and we have games, gifts, and more as well.”

Sydney, AUSTRALIA – Australian Chaldeans in Sydney have been wildly celebrating World Youth Day.  The excitement, exhilaration, and energy has been intoxicating says Joshua Shami, a Chaldean pilgrim from Europe.  Chaldean youth from around the world have gathered in Sydney in celebration of World Youth Day. 

“We continue to pray for our Chaldean brothers and sisters stuck in Iraq,” says Shami.  For many Chaldeans in Austrialia, the joy of welcoming Pope Benedict XVI to the World Youth Day celebration was dampened by the absence of a Chaldean Catholic delegation from Iraq.  “For months people have been working on getting the Iraqi Delegation to Sydney, but it is one thing after another stopping them.” 

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UR of the Chaldees was the port of CHALDEA (Babylonia), a major trade and commerce post.  Citizens of the region along with dwellers on the gulf with distant countries of India , Ethiopia , and Egypt. Change in economics and political power left the port abandoned about 500 B.C., but long continued to be a sacred city.

UR means light, or the moon city, a city of the Chaldees, the largest city of SHINAR or Northern CHALDEA, and the principal commercial centre of the country as well as the centre of political power.  It stood near the mouth of the Euphrates River, on its western bank, and is represented by the mounds (of bricks cemented by bitumen) of El-Mugheir, i.e., "The Bitumined," or "The Town of Bitumen," now 150 miles from the sea and some 6 miles from the Euphrates River, a little above the point where it receives the Shat el-Hie from the Tigris River. It was formerly a maritime city, as the waters of the Chaldean Gulf (mistakenly called Persian Gulf ) reached thus far inland.

Chaldea is the land bordering the Persian Gulf that gave its name to the ruling dynasty and thus became a synonym for Babylonia itself.  The tribal territory covering the southern marshes and coastal plains of ancient Iraq bordering the Persian Gulf was called by outsiders “Chaldean land” after the name of the tribes inhabiting the area. This Babylonian name was followed by the Greek, while the Hebrew followed an old dialect form.

The origin of the Chaldeans is often mixed, but scholars suspect the tribe may well be in the west, or else branches of the tribal family moved there (cf. Job 1:17). The general name for the area is unknown, since Chaldean tribes were part of Sumer (SHINAR). Qualification of Abraham’s home city UR as “of the Chaldeans” (Gen. 11:28, 31; 15:7; as later Neh. 9:7; cf. Acts 7:4) was used as a description to distinguish the city from other places with a similar name, Ur`.

The Catholic News Agency reports that the Australian government has denied visas to dozens of Chaldean World Youth Day pilgrims from Iraq.  Australian officials say they are concerned that participants will not return home and instead will seek asylum in Australia. One Chaldean Catholic priest called the decision “a slap at young people who wanted to go to witness to the faith and the joy of the church’s living in Iraq despite sufferings.”

Initially the Australian government denied visas for nearly 170 pilgrims, allowing only ten visas to aspiring World Youth Day participants, the SIR News Agency says. According to the website Baghdadhope, there are now only about 30 total visas available that will be granted “in extremis.”

Father Rayan P. Atto, parish priest of Mar Qardagh Church in Erbil, told SIR News Agency that the concerns about asylum seekers were unfounded, arguing that, “for young Christian Iraqis, taking part in the WYD in Sydney was not a way to leave their country.”

Chaldeans who are bilingual or Multilingual have an advantage over the rest of us, and not just in terms of communication skills. The multilingual brain develops more densely, giving it an advantage in various abilities and skills, according to new research.

According to the 2002 U.S. Census, more than 7.5 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 (about 14 %) speak a language other than English at home and the number of bilingual speakers is expected to increase in the coming years.

Most children have the capacity and facility to learn two or more languages. Research suggests there are advantages to being bilingual, such as, linguistic and metalinguistic abilities and cognitive flexibility, such as, concept formation, divergent thinking and general reasoning and verbal abilities.

Researchers from the Department of Imaging Neuroscience and experts from the Fondazione Santa Lucia in Rome researched brain densities of bilingual people. They recruited 25 people who speak one language, 25 who learned a second European language before age 5, and 33 who became bilingual between ages 10 and 15. 

All the participants spoke English as their primary language. Those who had learned a second language later in life had practiced it regularly for at least five years.

Michigan, USA - It is no coincidence that nearly 1,000 fathers had to lose their life 100 years ago for the right message to be heard. That message is that we love our fathers, but how and why did they lose their lives.  Most of those that died were Italian immigrants, writes Fr. Eugene Francis Briggs (1908-2006), a Catholic priest and a Fitchburg native who dedicated much of his life to the study of the Monongah disaster.  A tragedy by any standards, whereby on December 6, 1907, there was a mining disaster at the Consolidated Coal Company in Monongah, West Virgina that claimed their lives.  It is still considered the worst mining disaster ever.

In the spirit of those fathers that the First Father’s Day was born of the father’s role of provider and the risk he takes as a laborer throughout the country, being a primary wage earner.  “The same holds true to for our Chaldean fathers,” says Tom Issa, a father of three.  “Our Chaldean fathers literally climbed mountains and crossed oceans to provide and protect their family.”

Issa adds that Chaldean fathers continue to take incredible risks providing for their families.  “They work very long hours in some of the most horrible conditions, trapped in bullet proof and risking their lives.  It is good that we acknowledge, celebrate, and honor their sacrifice to our family and community.”  Issa speaks of the inaugural “Honor Thy Father” dinner hosted by Mother of God Church in Southfield, Michigan.  The dinner brought over 400 Chaldeans out for a night of dinner, entertainment, and applause for Chaldean fathers. 

{Must be a registered member of www.chaldean.org to view the photos of the 2008 Father / Son Celebration Dinner}