Church leaders on the Indonesian island of Flores were mobilizing relief workers and assessing damage this weekend, after a powerful earthquake killed scores of people and destroyed more than 900 homes.
The magnitude 7.7 quake caused landslides and triggered a tsunami warning.
Thousands of people spent the night between Saturday and Sunday outdoors, as hundreds of aftershocks continued to shake the island.
‘Unlike anything I have felt before’
Archbishop Paulus Boedhie Kleden of Ende archdiocese on Flores was on a pastoral visit when the quake began, early on Saturday morning.
“It was terrible,” the archbishop told Crux Now. “I have experienced earthquakes many times,” he said, “but the magnitude and length of this earthquake were unlike anything I have felt before.”
Kleden told Crux Now he made three forays to survey damage and visit people during the day Saturday, and found people in frantic flight to higher ground.
“I went out three times,” he said, “in the morning, and then during midday, and later in evening. I met our people, who were running away to go to higher places,” many of them taking forest roads.
Kleden said the early hour at which the quake struck was “providential.”
“The earthquake struck around 6 o’clock in the morning,” he said.
“Imagine it should have happened earlier,” he said, “most of the people would have been still asleep – or later, and many children would already have been in schools and adults in their workplaces.”
He said people are frightened and unsure of what will happen next.
“People are very afraid,” the archbishop told Crux Now, “they don’t know when they can go back to their homes,” or if they have homes. “They’re looking at devastating losses,” he said, “their houses are destroyed or very heavily damaged.”
“They’re facing insecurity and a sense of hopelessness,” he said.
Indonesia’s newest diocese affected
Flores is a predominantly Catholic island in Muslim-majority Indonesia, and the Catholic response was swift.
Bishop Maximilianus Rex, appointed in 2024 to be the very first bishop of the recently erected Diocese of Labuan Bajo at the western end of Flores, told Crux Now he was urging people “to remain calm yet vigilant,” and to follow instructions from civil authorities.
He is also calling the Church – priests, religious, and lay faithful – to action.
“In a situation like this,” he said, “faith cannot merely be spoken; it must be present. Prayer must translate into action, and compassion must take concrete form.”
National Caritas response
Caritas Indonesia is coordinating with all the dioceses in the affected area and has already activated its emergency response.
“Caritas Indonesia is responding swiftly to the earthquake disaster,” the Executive Director of Caritas Indonesia, Fr. Fredy Rante Taruk, said in remarks carried by Vatican News.
“The mobilization of volunteers and Caritas teams in each diocese is already underway,” he said.
Taruk said Caritas teams and volunteers are providing assistance and supporting evacuation efforts.
Other urgent needs include safety support, clean water, ready-to-eat food, shelter kits, hygiene kits, emergency health services, and extra support for children and the elderly, who tend to be particularly vulnerable
Caritas also says people with disabilities and those requiring regular medication are a special concern.