Christian community holds first Christmas festival in Sukkur

Event organised to unite churches, parachurches ahead of Dec 25 celebrations

SUKKUR: Christmas is just around the corner and the Christian community of Sukkur organised its first Christmas festival Tuesday night comprising all the churches and parachurches (Christian faith-based organisations) in the area in order to provide a platform to unite the community. The festival site was decorated with colourful lights, complemented by women and children in colourful dresses. The event was jointly organised by the Riverside Development Organisation (RDO), Lifeline, Overflowing Mercy Foundation and The House of Miracle.

Dr Yousuf Sadiq of Lifeline spoke about his non-governmental organisation’s activities and said that besides providing medical assistance to the poor and needy, they also provide non-formal education, for which Sunday schools are being run in different communities. According to him, Lifeline played a vital role in mitigating the sufferings of the flood victims in 2010 and also established village schools in 2013 to provide basic education to the children.



Pastor Gabriel Ilumdin of the Bet Husda Church in Old Sukkur said that that at least 500 people attend services at his church. “We are providing all possible assistance to our community, besides guiding them to the path of God,” he said. “As our church is situated in a slum in Nusrat Colony No 5, there is no [proper] road, due to which people are facing problems in attending the services,” lamented Pastor Ilumdin. He demanded the Sindh government, district administration and elected representatives to build a road in their locality to ease their problems.

Reverend Muneer Basheer expressed his jubilance over the gathering of the entire Christian community belonging to different churches. “Today’s world has changed a lot and different technologies, which are aimed at providing better facilities to people, have diverted them from the path of God. Ironically, today youngsters are giving more time to their laptops and mobile phones, but cannot spare sometime for God,” he lamented. He advised the youth to spare some time for God to seek guidance towards the right path.

“Today I feel proud to provide education to 500 children from the slums,” said RDO director Munawar Gill. “So far we are providing education to boys and girls up to class seven but pretty soon it will be upgraded to Matric and then Intermediate level.” Besides providing education to the children, we are also running non-formal education and vocational training centres where women are being educated, he said.



Pastor Sarfaraz Gill, Pastor Naveed Gill and others sang hymns while children from different churches presented tableaux portraying the birth of Jesus Christ and other significant events in Christian history. Cute little girls, dressed in white dresses, danced to the tune of religious songs.

The organisers of the event invited the Sukkur DIG, deputy commissioner of Sukkur and mayor of the Sukkur Municipal Corporation, of which only the mayor came to attend the event. He came late and left after delivering a brief speech and cutting the cake.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2016.