How Church lost 46 members in plane crash

The Christian community in Indonesia was the hardest hit by crash of AirAsia Flight QZ8501, it has emerged.

Seven crew members and 155 passengers were aboard the crashed plane, 46 of them – almost one-third of those on board – from the same Christian denomination, the Mawar Sharon church, CNN has reported.

“There was no single reason that members of Mawar Sharon, a Protestant faith with about 45,000 members around Indonesia, got on the AirAsia Airbus plane Sunday, beyond a common desire to get to Singapore in time for New Year’s Eve. They weren’t heading to one event. They didn’t all necessarily know one another, having attended services at different churches mostly around Surabaya, the Indonesian city where the commercial airliner took off,” the report said.

The plane was heading for Malaysia when it disappeared and was later confirmed to have crashed into the Java Sea. Efforts are on-going to recover the crashed plane and remains of the victims. At least four more bodies were recovered today, taking the count to 34.

CNN quoted Pastor Lianggone Tejo Bunarto as acknowledging that Mawar Sharon members are struggling to come to terms with the monumental tragedy. “They may not understand why the plane went down. They may have trouble waiting for definitive word that their loved ones have been recovered, if that ever happens,” the report said.