Pontifical charity provides solar panels to Church in Syria and Lebanon

By Joseph Tulloch

For the past few years, Aid to the Church in Need has been providing solar power to parishes, religious orders and schools across crisis-struck Syria and Lebanon.

Electricity is prohibitively expensive in the two countries, which are in the grip of a crippling financial crisis.

State-provided electricity is only available for a few hours a day, and this has a profound effect on the Church’s ability to run its orphanages, nursing homes, religious houses and schools.  

For this reason, over the past few years the Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), a Pontifical Foundation, has approved over 60 projects across Syria and Lebanon, worth more than 1.7 million dollars.

The organisation says that a total of 24 religious congregations, 37 parishes , 11 convents, 7 seminaries and novitiates, and 22 schools have been or will be benefitted by these projects.

"Tools to build our future"

In Zgharta, northern Lebanon, ACN has been providing solar power to the Mar Antonios school, run by the Antonine congregation.

One teacher there told ACN that “the situation is complicated, we are suffering from the crisis, but … the presence of solar panels has changed a lot of things, particularly in terms of teaching. We now have electricity for the digital blackboards, and we can teach in better conditions.”

A student added that “these new solar panels are really going to change our daily lives. They will enable us to understand our lessons better. It's like you're giving us the tools to build our future.”

The Congregation of the Holy Family, who work in particular with intellectually disabled people, have also received help from ACN.

Sister Yaout, a member of the Congregation, said that “we used to have to pay a subscription to the generator, which cost us 30 dollars, plus expenses of between 300 and 400 dollars, but now with the solar panels it is down to 6 dollars.”

These savings mean that the sisters can now charge groups less for staying at the convent’s guesthouse.