God's work:
"For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in:" Matthew 25:35 [1]
"...Lord, when did we see thee hungry, and fed thee; thirsty, and gave thee drink?" Matthew 25:37 [2]
"Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me." Matthew 25:40 [3]
Quoted in part from La Croix International [4]:
A Turkish court has sentenced Syrian Orthodox monk to 25 months in prison on terrorism charges after he gave a piece of bread to two people who had turned up at the gates of his monastery.The Mardin Criminal Court found Syrian Orthodox monk Sefer Bileçen guilty of complicity with terrorist organizations and activities as the people he helped were members of the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) that the Ankara government classifies as a terrorist organization.The monk is custodian of the old Syrian Orthodox monastery of Mor Yakup (St Jacob) in Nusaybin (formerly Nisibi, now part of the Turkish province of Mardin).
Quoted in part from Aid To The Church In Need ACN Ireland [5]:
On the 7th April, a court in Turkey sentenced a Syriac Orthodox monk to prison for giving “help to a terrorist organisation”. Father Sefer Bileçen, informally known as Fr. Aho, was sentenced to 25 months in prison after being found guilty on trumped up charges of assisting PKK fighters. The trial was held behind closed doors. Fr. Aho was not at the courtroom and categorically rejects the charges. Fr. Aho gave bread to two PKK fighters who visited his monastery to request food. The PKK, or in English the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, is an outlawed Kurdish Maoist terrorist organisation, which has previously carried out suicide bombs and is involved in fighting in Syria.Fr. Aho is an Assyrian priest in the Syriac Orthodox Church. He was serving as the custodian the Monastery of St. Jacob at the time of the incident....Fr. Aho does not deny giving bread to the PKK fighters but is rightly insistent that his actions were not political but rather Christian charity. He said that he would have given food to anyone who asked for it at the monastery as he is commanded to do so by the Christian Faith. He has also said he will not lie about giving the PKK members food as the Faith commands him to tell the truth.Fr. Aho is plainly not a terrorist sympathiser, but rather a man of God....
[5] https://www.acnireland.org/journal/2021/4/9/turkey-imprisons-syriac-monk-for-act-of-charity, quoted without bold emphasis.
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