CHURCH IN THE VILLAGE OF KAFTOUN - KOURA - LEBANON Mar Sarkis Excavations - The ruins before restoraion Fresco - Saint Sergius and Bacchus The restoration Kaftoun is a small Lebanese village located along the north bank of the Nahr el Jaouz (Walnut River), in the District of Koura, North Lebanon. The old Mar Sarkis Church by the banks of the Jaouz River, which is presently being excavated, was erected in their honor (600-700 A.D.)

MAR SARKIS MONASTERY - BSHARRE - AND GIBRAN KHALIL GIBRAN (6th January 1883 - 10th April 1931) MUSEUM LEBANON Deir Mar Sarkis, a well known monastery in Zgharta Lebanon as well as all the Maronite Churches around the world still use Syriac, which is a dialect of Aramaic, during Church liturgies. Maronite priests must learn Aramaic in order to enter priesthood. The monastery is the burial site of famous Lebanese-American poet and writer Khalil Gibran. The museum is on several levels, the lowest being a bedroom that is also where he is buried inside the rock. "I am alive like you. And now I stand beside you, Close your eyes and look around, You will see me in front of you." Gibran's epitaph from the Mar Sarkis Monastery in Bsharri, Lebanon where he was laid to rest in 1932.

MARONITE DIOCESE OF TRIPOLI - PARISH CHURCH IN BASLOUKIT - LEBANON Basloukit residents came together and inhabitated in the village to escape from the persecution. They considered attentively the life of these two great martyrs and found them good patrons and defenders. We do not know exactly when Basloukit residents considered Saints Serge and Bacchus as their Patrons. Tradition says that the first families who arrived to the village built a small church having the name of these two patrons. However, it is certain that since 300 years a picture for the two martyrs Serge and Bacchus was drawn in 1705 by Father Boulous Mouawad from Basloukit. This is the picture that we see now in the church . The current church was built in 1929 at the expense of the villagers resident in basloukit and abroad. It was built in the era of Patriarch Antoun Arida when he was bishop of Tripoli Diocese.