WHO IS FRANS?

Frans Vanderlught, or Father Frans is a Jesuit priest. He was born on the 10th of April 1938, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and was assassinated on the 7th of April 2014 in Homs, Syria. He was known to be the manager of the Jesuit monastery in Homs, Syria. Frans joined the Jesuits in 7th of September 1959, his long journey with the Jesuits started from the Netherlands where he studied philosophy, to Lebanon where he studied Arabic, and then Frans to study () followed by his doctorate in psychology and psychotherapy. He became a priest on the 29th of May 1971.

Since his early days in the Netherlands, Frans had a massive interest in supporting the people in need. He wrote his Doctorate thesis on the topic of married priests, this was because of his interest in the experiences of the many groups and individuals that he met in his life and their different ideologies.

Frans visited Syria in 1966 to meet the students at the city of Homs, then he travelled back to Europe to continue his studies. Frans moved to Syria permanently as from 1976, he worked continuously along all the different cities of Damascus, Homs, Aleppo, Latakia, giving multiple lectures based on his areas of expertise in psychology, religion, and spiritualism. He worked on supporting the many youth groups in Aleppo, Damascus, and Homs. He believed that there is no future for the church and Christians in Syria without opening to the other groups, especially Muslims.

Thus, he launched the hiking project in Syria, which focused on the humans. Involving youth from different cities, religions, all hiking together exploring Syria and exploring each other. Frans then launched “Al Ard” project in Homs, which translates to “The Land” or “The Earth”. This is an agriculture project in the suburbs of Homs with connection to the Christian and Muslim villages. The project had a special focus on people with disability and people with special needs through different empowering activities. In all of his projects, Frans showed a massive dedication and he illustrated his ability to interact with different people from the different communities with their ideologies. This was due to his ability to establish relationships that are built on trust, and respect to the different values that humans believe in.

Frans was known in implementing the spiritual guidelines when interacting with others. Such as positive expectations from the other person that allows for focusing on the good in the others. He was also known to be a very good listener, which made people around him feel respected and understood. These values made him a suitable person to take responsibilities such as the manager of the monastery in Homs and Damascus, and a representative of the regional manager in Syria.

His death:
On the 7th of April 2014, Frans was assassinated by an unknown gunman in Homs Syria. The Gunman stormed into the monastery during the military siege on Homs (part of the Syrian civil war) and he shot father Frans. The Syrian people, his colleagues and friends, and the Vatican expressed severe pain and sorrow for his death. He was buried in the same monastery where he served for more than 30 years.

His books:
From failure to success
Listening and love
Who are you love?

Al Ard

Al Ard is like a large monastery, with a land (75 hectar) that hosts various agriculture spaces, a centre for the people with disabilities and special needs, a centre for participatory prayers for people from different religions, a wine making room, and a workshop to manufacture ceramic.

In its beginnings, Al Ard was a place for christians and muslims to meet and communicate together. Afterwards, supporting disabled people became an additional priority, this was followed with launcing various handwork workshops to manufacture clothes, ceramic, education for women in small villages, and a candle making workshop.

Al ard included multiple caravans to host guests, and the disabled people centre can host up to 100 people with special needs to empower them and support them by teaching them handcrafts to support themselves.

Al Ard welcomed all people from different backgrounds. Visitors followed the daily timetable that consisted of daily meetings, lectures, workshops, meditation, yoga sessions, in addition to maintainance work for the space itself.

The project also involved some premanant residents who were working at the space in return for a basic salary. Some of the most enjoying activities were mutual prayers involving Christians, Muslims, and others praying together. Frans said about al Ard: “our main goal is to serve the Syrian human, and the disabled persons in the region from whatever religion where all people are working together to empower their bonds and to empower their belonging to the country. Also, one of our main goals is to support the people in the sburbs since we are here in the suburbs of Homs”.