ARMENIAN GENOCIDE MEMORIAL TO BE ERECTED IN COSTA MESA
16:06, 6 March, 2015
YEREVAN, MARCH 6, ARMENPRESS. A memorial dedicated to the 100th
anniversary of the Armenian Genocide will be erected at St. Mary
Armenian Apostolic Church in Costa Mesa, California. As reports
“Armenpress” citing Daily Pilot, the opening ceremony will be held
on March 8. On March 8, after the dedication, the church will hold
a commemorative ceremony at Orange Coast College’s Robert B. Moore
Theatre. Archbishop Hovnan Derderian, primate of the Western Diocese
of the Armenian Church, will lead an invocation and benediction,
and speeches and musical performances will round out the program.
The diocese has recently undertaken a similar project, dedicating
the Holy Martyrs’ Monument in January at its headquarters in Burbank.
Other commemorative events are planned around Southern California in
the coming months, including “LIFE:100,” an art exhibit at the Brand
Library & Art Center in Glendale, and LA2DC, a genocide-awareness
cycling and running marathon from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C.
Will the commemorations this year make a difference — especially
for those who have refused to budge in the past? Tashjian, who has
served as St. Mary’s pastor since 1992, hopes so.
“I only pray, as a priest, that the government of Turkey, once and for
all, will recognize and do justice to the deceased Armenian citizens
of Turkey,” he said. “This is my prayer and wish, and I hope I see
that in my lifetime.”
Among other things, the Daily Pilot reported: “When Moushegh
Tashjian was growing up, his father never spoke to him much about his
experience surviving the Armenian genocide. But he and his siblings
heard harrowing stories about it from their grandmother.
Actually, she wasn’t their real grandmother — something Tashjian
only realized as he grew older. His father’s mother had perished in
the Turkish government’s campaign, which began during World War I
and, by typical estimates, left 1.5 million dead. After Tashjian’s
grandmother died, his grandfather married a woman who had lost two
husbands and three children in the forced marches across the desert.
Hearing her accounts as a child, Tashjian — now the pastor of St. Mary
Armenian Apostolic Church in Costa Mesa — felt hatred toward those
who had victimized his family and others.
Only in later years, he said, did he let that attitude slip.
“As a young child, as a young boy, I would picture a Turk with
the Ottoman-style clothing, with fez, with, what do you call it,”
he said, drawing the shape of a robe with his hands as he sat in the
community room of St. Mary last week. “And with a sword. And I would
see pictures of Turks slaughtering Armenians. They were everywhere.
“And, of course, yeah we wanted justice. And we still do.”
On March 8, the Eastside church will dedicate the Genocide Centennial
Monument, a sculpture that features a pair of white marble pillars
connected by a cross, set on a black granite base where a small
fountain, flame and garden will eventually reside.
The church formed a remembrance committee and called for artists to
submit designs. Nearly a dozen entries came in, and Harout Joulhaian, a
Burbank resident who sometimes attends St. Mary services, got the nod.
Joulhaian, who grew up in Syria and moved to the United States 10
years ago, was partly inspired by his grandparents, who survived the
genocide. In crafting his design, he aimed for a mixture of somberness
and hope.
“The fountain and the flame and the black granite represent the
memory of our tragic past and symbolize the life and immortality of
the 1.5 million Armenians,” Joulhaian said. “And the white two pillars
symbolize our new generation and the bright future, which is that we
are living now in this free country and we can express our feelings.
These two white pillars are attached with the cross, which symbolizes
our Christian faith and belief.”
St. Mary’s congregation raised money to pay for the monument, which
Tashjian estimated would cost between $50,000 and $60,000. Some members
of the church donated construction work for free; contractors will
do the rest.”