Jesuit Monastery in Homs and the Grave of Frans van der Lugt

The Jesuit Fathers’ Monastery (Deir al-Aba al-Yasu’iyin) stands with its school in Bustan al-Diwan, the Christian quarter of the Old City of Homs. What brings most visitors is a grave. Frans van der Lugt, a Dutch Jesuit priest, refused to leave the city during the siege of the Old City. On 7 April 2014 he was shot dead in the monastery garden, and he was buried in its grounds. The monastery’s founding date and architecture are not recorded in the sources available, so this page covers only what is documented.

Where it is

The monastery is less than 100 m northeast of the National Evangelical Church. The Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace is on the same line of churches, a few minutes’ walk away. There are no published coordinates; the easiest way to find it is to ask for it by its Arabic name, دير الآباء اليسوعيين.

Who Father Frans was

Frans van der Lugt was born in the Netherlands on 10 April 1938. He came to Syria in 1966 and spent the rest of his life here. In 1980 he founded Al-Ard, a community centre and farm just outside Homs, where young people with disabilities did much of the work in the vineyards and gardens. After 2011 he stayed at this monastery in Bustan al-Diwan. In early 2014 he posted videos from the besieged Old City asking for help. That year the United Nations evacuated 1400 people from the besieged city, and he chose to stay.

After his death a cause for his beatification was opened, formally launched in Homs on 6 April 2019. In 2022 it emerged that he had made comments to tourists minimising clerical sexual abuse, and the cause was put on hold; it has not moved since.

The monastery after the war

The monastery school was badly damaged in the war. In May 2015, a year after the Old City was reopened, young volunteers at the monastery were still running aid work for returning families. At Easter 2019 it was listed among the places in Homs holding services, and that May a poetry evening was held in its courtyard on the third night of the Old Homs Festival. In October 2021 Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna visited the grave during a tour of the Old City. No later source was found showing whether it is open to visitors.

How long it takes

Half an hour, enough for the grave and the courtyard. The monastery is not a museum; if the door is closed, a visit is arranged by asking at the door.

Do not miss

The grave itself. On a walk that also takes in the cathedral and the Evangelical church, this is the one stop on the Old City’s line of churches that tells the story of a person rather than a building.