The Boyajians Come to St. Nersess Seminary:  A Case Study in Love, Faith and Outreach

Sarkis and Alice Boyajian had arrived at St. Nersess Armenian Seminary by a flock of eager seminarians, with loving embraces just as if they were greeting their beloved grandparents. And this was obviously not the Boyajians' first visit. As parents of three grown children they had come to St. Nersess decades ago when they brought their children to the enormously popular Summer Conferences for young people. Now as grandparents, their current mission was a different one. The Boyajians were not here to deposit their children, they had clearly come to work, with mops and buckets and cleaning solutions in tow.

And work they did. Allowing little time to recover from the journey, they moved into action. Sark scraped and prepared the floor for new paint. Alice put away bags of groceries she brought. Sark installed new cabinets he brought from the Midwest. Alice baked a cake. Sark installed lighting in the front entry. Alice cleaned out the refrigerator. Sark fixed a door lock. Alice did laundry. Sark ran out to get plumbing supplies. Alice went along to navigate. Sark climbed a ladder to do some maintenance. Alice is putting a chicken in the oven...

Who are these wonderful Boyajians who drive 800 miles from Palos Heights, Ill., to St. Nersess Seminary a few times a year laden with tools, hardware, cabinets, food and inexhaustible stores of energy and love? What has possessed them to spend weeks of their life over the past year painting, wiring, plastering, renovating, building, cooking, and organizing at St. Nersess, accepting not a penny. in return?

"We owe this and more to St. Nersess for everything you've given our children," said Alice.

"And our parish in Palos!" Sark chimes in, referring to Fr. Tavit Boyajian, a graduate of St. Nersess Seminary and the Boyajians' dynamic parish priest at Sts. Joachim and Anne Armenian Church in Palos Heights. "We're retired, we have a little time now, and we thought the best place to direct our energies would be St. Nersess, because that's where our future priests are coming from, and that's where our young people are going to rediscover their Armenian roots and their Christian faith," Sark added eagerly. "But enough of that, I've got to get to those basement stairs before the paint dries," he said, guarding his sticky paintbrush as he marched out of the room.

The days of furious activity became a week. The only respite was in the morning and evening as the "grandparents" paused to join the seminarians with Fr. Daniel Findikyan, Dean of St. Nersess; Fr. Simeon Odabashian; and Dr. Abraham Terzian; in the Seminary chapel for Armenian prayers. And there was also the dinner table, where Sark was never without a story about the family, old times at St. Nersess, or old friends and common relatives.

The odds and ends of the various repairs and renovations transformed the place in a short time. Soon the Boyajians were packing up to leave. The anticipation of their departure cast a slight pall over the Seminary. "We'll be back the second week in September," Sark told Fr. Daniel as the rear door of the SUV slammed shut. "That kitchen floor needs to be stripped and waxed."

And they were gone. The Boyajians left a seminary with marked improvements. But they left St. Nersess--and its seminarians--something far more important: a living lesson in love and a testament to their faith in a unique community of Armenian-American young men who have given their lives to the Armenian Church and to God at St. Nersess. Even the Bible couldn't have said it better.

By John Aslanian
July 2003