Our Mission

• To promote and support enduring friendships and partnerships between parishes, communities and people in the western border region of East Timor and the Catholic parishes, communities and people of Brisbane.
• To facilitate the mutual sharing of gifts, skills and resources so as to nourish the spiritual development and well being of the participating parishes, communities and people.
• Bear witness to, and live out, Christ's command to love one another.

Our Action

• FPET is a Brisbane based non-profit organisation working with the people of Atabae subdistrict to re-establish self-sustaining communities.
• While financial and other material assistance has been important, especially for education and health, the Atabae people value most our prayers and continuing friendship which is sustained by exchange visits and whatever other communication that can be achieved.
• Supporting and collaborating with PALMS Australia volunteers based in Atabae has grealy strengthened our relationship with the Atabae community.

We must not forget that following over 400 years of foreign domination, East Timor suffered near total destruction of its already limited infrastructure and economy as the Indonesians withdrew in 1999. Recovery will take decades and needs support from Australia and elsewhere.

Most of our website is easily navigated but the news archive pages and some other stories are accessed by the index link at the bottom of the current "News" page. Those pages provide more of our story since the inception of the website early in 2005, which was when Nick and Jane Eager moved to Atabae.

We became more aware of the problems of the East Timorese people through the Australian army personnel relating the situation to Catholic communities in Brisbane. This led in 2001 to a visit of three Brisbane people to Atabae, a village near the West Timor border, to try to understand how we could ease the problems there. FPET was formally incorporated as an organisation soon after that visit to East Timor was completed. It has since focussed on working with the people of the Atabae sub-district.

It was obvious that there were more problems than a small volunteer group could manage but a commitment was made to develop a relationship and work with the people there. The main plea of the East Timorese at that time was "PLEASE DO NOT FORGET US" and this has remained as the underlying basis of the relationship which has continued to develop since then. Unfortunately, many who came once did not return.

The relationship is firstly based on a faith commitment to the universal nature of the Catholic Church and the resulting obligation to work together for the mutual benefit of all people. The barriers of distance, language, lack of communication facilities and terrible roads in East Timor have all presented difficulties but the relationship continues to grow and mature. The Catholic Church played a vital role in maintaining the hope of the East Timorese during the years of Indonesian occupation and continues to be a major player in the establishment of East Timor as a truly free and independent country. We work closely with the local priests, religious and community leaders who have been so important in restoring the country and supporting the local communities as well as linking where possible with the civil authorities and other non-government organisations.

While initially quite preoccupied in helping with famine relief and providing basic necessities for survival, we are now looking much more toward building self sustaining communities. However, we continue providing some support for the many widows and orphans.

PALMS Austrlia is a very experienced Catholic lay agency that trains and places volunteers in overseas countries. It is an extremely valuable partner in our work and enables us to have Australian sourced volunteers living in the Atabae community with professional support.

PALMS also manages our tax deductible donations fund and advises us on the selection and implementation of community development proposals. For further information on this very worthy organisation go to the PALMS website.