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Indonesian Earthquake Some of you will be interested to know (and, no doubt distressed about) the fact that the recent earthquake in Indonesia has impacted the Unitarian community there. We have had information from our main contact there that there have been no known deaths but that several houses have suffered cracks and some, demolition. Personal injuries might have been worse since the quake was in an area where there are congregations, but members happened to be in another part of Indonesia in annual assembly. Details of how one can contribute to the aid effort will be circulated as soon as it is available. From Ellen Kristi in Indonesia: Once again disaster struck my country. And now since the center of earthquakes is close to Java island, and close to several cities where our members dwell, some members of ours are affected. No human casualties, thank God, only their and their relatives' houses were cracked or shattered by the quakes. The center of quakes is only 30 km away from the coastline of Yogya. When the biggest quake happened at 5:50am, many of church members were in Sarangan, East Java, hundreds of kms away from Yogya, where we held our Annual Church Gathering until last Sunday. But we could feel the shake for about 10 seconds. At first we thought that finally Mount Merapy erupted, but we soon found out that we were wrong. It was not Merapi, but a 5.9 (other version says 6.2) Richter-scaled earthquake that brought down thousands of houses around Yogya. We have started to gather funds to help our members in Klaten. We also wanted to mobilize funds to provide basic needs to quakes victims. My husband, with his fellow worker in Habitat for Humanity, had surveyed Bantul as the worst site struck by the quakes and saw what the victims need most right now are shelter tents. Please keep on praying for us, not only for our members but also for our fellow Indonesians, victims of the quakes. If your church wants to contribute something to relieve a bit the refugees, we will do our best to help to manage that.
In faith, |