2017 Priests Retreat–Monday

Monday was a day for traveling from all over Cambodia (about the size of Wyoming) to Sihanoukville down on the southern coast of the kingdom.  The distances are not actually that great but for some of the priests it is a two-day trip because of the difficulty of travel in Cambodia.  This is Archbishop Sebastian Francis, our retreat leader.  Click here to see pictures from Monday.

Cambodia Priests Retreat

Today was the beginning of the annual retreat for all the priests of Cambodia.  It is held at the Catholic center in Sihanoukville and for most of us it was a travel day to this southernmost province in the kingdom.  In the picture, Bishop Olivier welcomes everyone to the gathering

The Internet doesn’t reach to my room and I have to go to another building to make these posts so I probably will only get to post things here once a day. On Tuesday I will set up a main page for the retreat which will link to the individual days.

Birthday Celebration

We are in the middle of a three-day holiday for the birthday of King Norodom Sihamoni seen here visiting a family in the provinces.  The king is a really nice person–the only smiling, human face in the government—but why three days for a birthday?  That is why Cambodia has twenty-five public government holidays.  The US has eleven.  How do you rebuild a country when no one works?