On Saturday, November 18th, executive members and alumni of CYMA will take part in the Western Diocese’s Student Open Forum. This venue will be a great place to voice an opinion and listen to other’s opinions on the role of the Armenian Church reaching out to the Armenian students. Actually, this open forum will challenge Armenian students to determine if the Armenian Church presents its messages in a relative way while providing feedback to the Mother Church on methods on how to become more involved with their daily needs. This type of forum requires something from both the host and the participants and I am looking forward to great ideas from both sides.

If you examine the CYMA mission, you will observe the CYMA program serves as a cornerstone for this type of interaction. The history of diasporan institutions working with Hayastan has not been well established. Hence, a gap has been created over the years of development in the diaspora separate and different from Hayastan. However, as Hayastan develops into a stronger and more prosperous republic, it will need a continuous influx of resources to sustain and develop itself. Luckily, we have a diaspora. Not only is this diaspora large, but it is global, and it is multicultural. This allows for many different specialties affecting a wide spectrum of development in the social, cultural, professional, and spiritual lives in Hayastan and Artsakh.

Now… back to students. Of course, there are many different modalities of the diaspora. Some have characterized a simplistic model of the diaspora as having four distinct parts, the old and the new, and the inner and outer. If you take students from each of these modalities, you find a segment of the model with very similar expectations, interests, and challenges.

This is where CYMA comes in.

Our mission is to leverage these resources that we have available in the diaspora and create an environment of collaboration between the diasproa, Hayastan and Artsakh. Through this collaboration, a bridge or transfer of knowledge and resources can be created and sustained. These resources are located in the spiritual, cultural, professional, and spiritual lives of both Armenians in Hayastan and the diaspora.

In other words, Bridge the Gap!

Bridging the gap through CYMA allows the Armenian Church to reach out to students and give them the opportunity to experience Hayastan. We accomplish this with a two week pilgrimage and an eight week internship program. Throughout the duration of either journey, participants have the ability to learn and share their ideas, skills and motivations with other Armenian students from around the diaspora and Hayastan.

This is not a one way road. We except and count on participants to come back to their diasporan communities not only with a deeper understanding of Hayastan, its challenges and its achievements, but also a deeper understanding of the diaspora and its role in Hayastan’s development. In addition, this allows for a new perspective on the significant role of the church through an enlightened spiritual foundation. It is difficult to understand the Armenian Apostolic Church, a traditional eastern orthodox church, in a western and modern society without witnessing its historical triumph first hand.

Through the auspicious of the Church CYMA is reaching out to all students and providing them with an opportunity to experience Haystan. I encourage everyone to find our more about CYMA and attend the open forum on Saturday. If you are interested in attending the open forum, here is a MAP to the Western Diocese Headquarters.

See ya Saturday….

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