PHNOM PENH (UCAN) -- Since the Catholic Church revived in Cambodia in the early 1990s, it has trained and produced just four local priests. Now it is looking to double that number.
Local Catholics were optimistic as the major seminary in Phnom Penh started its new academic year with four seminarians from all three Church jurisdictions in the country.
Borei Phan and Sat Sae come from Kompong Cham apostolic prefecture, Sok Na from Phnom Penh apostolic vicariate and Moung Rus from Battambang apostolic prefecture. Phan, Na and Rus, all 29, were formally accepted as seminarians after completing one year of preparation, while Sae, 27, began his preparatory year.
At a ceremony on Oct. 10 to open the 2008-2009 academic year, Rus, representing all four, asked Church leaders and other Catholics to continue supporting the seminary, "given the importance for our local Church to have native priests."
Bishop Emile Destombes, apostolic vicar of Phnom Penh, reinforced this request. The Paris Foreign Missions bishop asked Catholics to build relations with the seminarians and encourage them to increase love for their priestly vocation.
"I was the first missioner to come back to Cambodia in 1989," after two decades of civil war and religious persecution, he recalled. The first missioners to follow soon started the major seminary and gathered four young Cambodians who had long wanted to become priests. Now, those four seminarians and another Cambodian who did his training overseas "are our dear local clergy."
Welcoming ceremonies for Phan, Na and Rus were held in their respective Church jurisdictions.
On Oct. 12, Phan received his white cassock from Monsignor Antonysamy Susairaj, apostolic prefect of Kompong Cham, at the main church of Kompong Cham, 80 kilometers northeast of Phnom Penh.
The seminarian expressed his joy and gratitude to his family and the Catholic community present. He also asked them, "Do not forget me in your prayers so that the Lord can make me, in all my weakness, a humble instrument to spread his Good News of love to our beloved countrymen."
On Oct. 19, Bishop Destombes formally accepted Na as a seminarian of Phnom Penh apostolic vicariate at Chom Pa Catholic Vietnamese Church, in the presence of hundreds of Catholics.
A local laywoman named Chi told UCA News, "We need many young people in our country to follow in the footsteps of this young man."
The welcoming ceremony in Battambang apostolic prefecture, based 255 kilometers northwest of Phnom Penh, took place on Aug. 15, feast of the Assumption.
Father Totet Banaynal, vicar general of the prefecture, told UCA News: "The acceptance of Rus as a seminarian is a good opportunity for all of us to renew our commitment to encourage young people to consider consecrating themselves as priests or Religious sisters to serve the Church and society."
The major seminary opened in 1992 in Battambang, but moved in 1998 to the capital. Its first four seminarians -- now Fathers Un Son, Lay Paul, Soun Hang Ly and Gnet Viney -- were ordained together in December 2001, two of them for Phnom Penh and one each for Battambang and Kompong Cham.
However, the first native Cambodian priest to be ordained after the war years was Father Tonlop Sophal, who did his priestly studies in Canada and France. He was ordained on June 2, 1995, in Phnom Penh.
The current policy of the Church in Cambodia is to form seminarians inside the country as a way to strengthen the local Church and develop in local priests a love for their own culture by having them learn philosophy and theology in their own language as much as possible.
According to seminary rector Father Bruno Cosme, "life in the seminary does not mean only studying, but also helping the seminarians know each other well and learn to live together."
The Paris Foreign Missions priest told UCA News the current program involves four years of philosophy studies at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, during which the seminarians also study the Bible and some theology courses in the seminary. Afterward, they will study theology full-time for three years.
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