REQUIEM SOLEMNY PRESIDED BY CATHOLICOS OF ALL ARMENIANS AT SOGHOMON
TEHLERIAN’S GRAVE

FRESNO, JUNE 22, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. As it was already
stated, on June 15, in Sacramento, within the framework of a pastoral
visit to the US Western Deocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church,
Karekin II, Catholicos of All Armenians met with Arnold Schwarzenegger,
the Governor of California, the city authorities, law-makers and
senators of the state, including Senator Chuck Puchigian, of Armenian
origin. Before leaving for Sacramento, on June 14, the Catholicos of
All Armenians visited the California State University of Fresno where
there is an Armenian Studies Department as well. John Welty, the
President of the CSU Fresno Campus mentioned that there are students
of the Armenians origin at the University and it has numerous ties
with Armenia. Welty decorated His Holiness with the highest order of
the University. Then addressing his blessing to professors’ staff and
students of the University, the Catholicos of All Armenians presented
in details the mission of the Armenian Church and the present
achivements, particularly in the sphere of education. His Holiness
Karekin II appriciated services of the University in the issue of
bringing up and education of the youth, expressing his satisfaction
with the continual respect and love towards the Armenian people and
the Armenian Church. On the same day, Archbishops Nerses Pozapalian
and Vache Hovsepian, members of the retinue of the Catholicos of All
Armenians and ones of the elderly churchmen of the Mother See, and
clergymen of the deocese visited the old-aged pensioner’s home of
California. As Noyan Tapan was informed from the Information Center of
the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, the Catholicos of All Armenians
had a meeting with Roger Monteroy, the Fresno Mayor at the Mayor’s
Office on June 13. His Holiness mentioned that Armenians settled down
in Fresno after the 1898 Hamidian massacres and the 1915 Armenian
Genocide. The Catholicos of All Armenians also expressed his gratitude
to the state authorities of California and expressed a hope that once
the United States will recognize and condemn the Armenian Genocide.

Karekin II, Catholicos of All Armenians visited the Armenian community
school of Fresno where about 100 pupils study. On the same day, in
Fresno, a requiem was presided solemny by the Catholicos of All
Armenians at the grave of Soghomon Tehlerian. At the end of the
requiem, His Holiness preached about justice and Armenians’ invincible
soul, gifting his blessing to united pious Armenians.