Great need, many small joys, and an energetic sense of community: that was the year 2015 from the perspective of New Apostolic Christians in Asia and Australia, the second region to look back over the year on nac.today.
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Earthquake in Nepal: Priests Bel Bahadur (1st from left) and Indra Bahadur (5th from left) with injured members in front of the damaged church in Sipapokare.
Photo: NAC Canada
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Priest Bel Bahadur in front of his destroyed house.
Photo: NAC Canada
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Priest Indra Bahadur has also lost his house.
Photo: NAC Canada
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A glance into the destroyed Nepalese village.
Photo: NAC Canada
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On the way to church in Dharkhola
Photo: NAC Canada
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The damaged church in Dharkhola.
Photo: NAC Canada
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Competing against each other: District Apostles Mark Woll (Canada) and Andrew Andersen (Australia)
Photo: NAC Canada
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Move-A-Thon turned family celebration: the congregation in Hamilton
Photo: Brigitte Nycamp
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Confirmands from Toronto, Hamilton, and Kitchener covered their kilometres by canoe
Photo: Graham Stanford
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The participants from Toronto-East had this fantastic view of Lake Ontario
Photo: Randy Korn
Disaster relief in Nepal
In April and May of 2015 the world looked on in horror as disaster unfolded in Nepal: an earthquake of a magnitude of 7.8, as well as similarly serious aftershocks, devastated vast regions of the country. Some eight million people lost everything, or at least temporarily lost their homes and livelihoods.
New Apostolic relief agencies lined up together with other international aid organizations to lend a hand: NAK-karitativ and the Missionswerk from Germany, NAK-Humanitas from Switzerland, as well as the relief agencies of Canada and the USA were ready to help with money for both immediate emergency measures and longer-term development projects.
There was also support from this group for a reconstruction project in the Himalayan village of Sipapokhare. It is there that the local aid agency known as the New Apostolic Trust of Nepal is building new houses for 25 families.
Congregational life in South-East Asia
“We are a little flock,” says District Apostle Urs Hebeisen of the District Church of South-East Asia. And so the survey of the year in review in this region is touchingly modest. In Japan, the highlights of the year included a sealing service in the congregation of Matsuyama, as well as a confirmation service and the appointment of a new rector in Tama.
Indonesia listed the national meeting of district leaders and national choir leaders’ workshop as the highlight of its year. And Hong Kong looked back with special fondness to a visit of members to a prison.
Fund-raising competition in Australia
One of the most notable events in the District Church of Australia was a competition with the District Church of Canada to see which of the two districts could raise the most in donations. In this year’s Move-A-Thon 90 congregations in Canada competed against 70 congregations in Australia and New Zealand. The idea was to walk, jog, cycle, or paddle as many kilometres as possible and in so doing raise as much money as possible.
In the end, the Australians had to concede defeat to the Canadians. But financially it was a team victory: the District Church of Australia now has a piece of land for its very own relief agency. And Canada will use the donations it raised for aid projects to help the homeless.