Alberto de la Portilla – Page 92 – Comboni Lay Missionaries

Lent recollection from Uganda

18 March, 2019 by Alberto de la Portilla

We send our sincere greetings to you all from Uganda. We had our Lenten recollection on last Saturday 2nd March 2019 facilitated by Fr. Anthony Kibira MCCJ the Vice Provincial Superior of Uganda. In attendance we had all the religious Communities of; MCCJ Community, Comboni Missionary Sisters, Sacred Heart Sisters International, Missionary Sisters of Mary Mother of the Church, Evangelizing Sisters of Mary, Female Focolare Community and the Host Comboni Lay Missionaries. It was a very colourful moment to sit down as an Apostolic Community of Mbuya Parish to prepare us for the Lenten Period 2019.

Fr. Anthony chose the theme of the recollection as “Growing in Love” not only during this Lenten period but throughout our lives and deeds. He said growing in love is not an easy journey but allowing God’s love to grow in us is the best way. This he said requires us to let ourselves to allow love to be sown and grow in us.

In his talk he came up with obstacles that do not allow the love of God to grow in us manifested in very many ways;

Lack of openness to God and one another in which he emphasized unless we learn to be open to God for our mistakes we have done to him and other people, it will be very hard for love to grow in us. This lack of openness can also be associated with un-repented sins that we have deliberately failed to confess.

Prejudices we practice knowingly or unknowingly in our communities with items we use daily; my chair, cup, i.e. personalize everything and I am the only one using it, my parents told me I will never make it in life which is directly seeing your own image in the view of what people say about you…this is purely Pride. He emphasized that for love of God to grow in us, we must be very humble to avoid pride by accepting ourselves as human beings bound to sin and make mistakes but not like God.

He also pointed fear of change to be another obstacle affecting the love of God to grow in us. Many people associate newness to uncertainty in life looking at it in human eyes since we have been in our comfort zones before. Change of this is interfering with our comfort zones and we resist it at all means. He advised us not to resist any change in our lives and said Love does not force to grow in any one.

He also identified another obstacle to love of as being taken up by fashions of the day which are new according to the current enthusiastic of the day and yet the world always favours superficiality which is not the root of our spirituality. We need to take time and analyze our life concerning material things which may be affecting our spiritual growth.

He also pointed out that we are always crowded with so many interests that make us to be too busy to allow the seed of Love to grow in us. He stressed that we need some space for us to grow better by letting some interests in our life to go away and let our heart to be open to allow love to grow in our heart/life. Allow the right image of God to be in your life other than viewing God as a commander who is dangerous to judge us. He also said this is brought about by sin that makes the good image of God distorted and that threatens us to go back to him with Love with repentant heart. He tasked us to always ask; who is God in my life? He said let us allow God to let to do what he deserves to be done in us. He pointed some fruits of love of God in a person;

Ability to give one’s life by sacrificing oneself, something to live for others
Willingness to bring one’s burden to the Lord at all times whenever the burdens come to one’s life to the foot of the cross

He said Jesus did not only die for our sins and so we need to participate in the process of our salvation which always comes at a cost but not free. Fr. Anthony said we need to carry our daily cross with love which will eventually let us be infected with the spirit of love for all unconditionally.

He also pointed some of our past obstacles as all that caused us a very great hurt in the past to love God and one another i.e. our past wounds. He said some apostles followed Jesus up to the time he was arrested but fled after he was tortured, thereby leaving our Lord Jesus lonely in the company of Mother Mary and some few of the apostles. Has our past wounds caused us to abandoned the will of God to be done in us thereby making Jesus to feel fresh pains up to now? He challenged us to descend to all our past wounds, address the wounds to dress the wounds with the Love of God. Fr. Anthony said these wounds are always hidden and are out great treasures to the love of God if addressed well.

How to overcome these obstacles to the love of God;

Journey with the Lord all the time and have someone to show your wounds in private in the spirit of fraternity life in our different communities and places of work. He said Jesus did not heal people in public but in private.
He said we need to create these 40 days of Lent to be like Jesus; praying, fasting and giving alms to all. This should make us come out of the 40 days of the Lent to be matured in our individual spirits and emotions.
He said we need to be aware of procrastination during this Lenten period of not postponing fasting but run the race with our Master Jesus in fighting our temptations.
He said we need to use these 40 days of lent to identify our weakness which are our areas of growth as pointed by St. Paul in 2 Cor. 12:1-10. He said let our weakness not be obstacles to the love of God but to let God enter into our hearts. This can be possible if we can boldly speak of our weakness to our Spiritual Directors, our very close friends and other people no matter what it may be. This is the first process of healing our past wounds. We need to surrender all these weaknesses to Jesus under the foot of the cross by allowing God to work in our weaknesses.

In his ending remarks he talked about the homily of a Bishop during the ordination of some priests which is currently circulated in social media with 3 very important questions which is applicable to us as Comboni Lay Missionaries and other religious communities and Lay Christians. The Bishop asked the following questions which for our case we need to answer deep in our hearts, insert yourself in the place of the Priest;

Are they weak enough to become Priests? It’s only a weak Priest who can make a weak person to come of his/her weakness. This requires spirit of humility
Are they broken enough to become Priests? It’s only a holistically broken Priest who can help a broken Christian to overcome his/her brokenness and allow the love of God to grow in his/her heart. This does not need Pride in one’s life.
Are they afraid enough to be Priests? It’s only a Priest who is afraid of sin that can let Christians live the life he preaches and preaches what he lives, actions speak louder than words

With these allow us to wish you all a fruitful Lenten Period as we evaluate our life in the past one year to allow God to correct our short comings so that his love grows in our life in all that we do. St. Daniel Comboni says the works of salvation are born under the foot of Calvary (Cross).

Comboni Lay Missionaries Uganda

Mission Echoes from the Central African Republic

12 March, 2019 by Alberto de la Portilla

“Here I am sending you some tidbits on mission life.” With these words our dear friend María Augusta embraces us and writes on what is going on in the mission of the CAR. Ana [CLM from Poland] had a problem with an elbow. X-rays were taken and then we went with her to the military medical center in Bangui. People there were very kind and helpful. God willing, we will have lunch with them tomorrow. Gratefully, the rest of us is doing well. We had news from Fr. Samuel, who is also doing well, taking advantage of his vacation to rest and to visit family and friends. This week a mother with twin girls came to us. She had already been here other times to ask for milk, because she did not have enough for both babies. They were already undernourished. We took care of them and they had returned home in good shape. Now she came with one of the babies being very skinny, and weighing only 2 Kg at 9 months… I was very stressed by it and immediately I went with the mother to the place where we treat those who are undernourished, to have her admitted. I do not know whether she is going to make it! May the Lord do what is best for her. Little Andrés, the orphan I met in November 2015 and to whom we gave milk, has Pott disease (vertebral tuberculosis). He was taken to the pediatrician in Bangui and now he is being treated for it. Later he will undergo surgery like Gervelais*, who up to this point was not able to walk, but after two months of this TB treatment, has already started to take a few steps and it is clear he has a lot of inner strength to make him want to learn how to walk in a hurry. At the school we have started two remedial classes** of 90 minutes each, twice a week. In the early years we concentrate on reading and writing. And then later we add Mathematics. May the Lord give our students strength and good will so as not to fail, but may improve their chances. By God’s grace we have some students with a lot of will power… this is what gives us the encouragement to continue. We are grateful to the Lord who gives us good health, happiness and the will to keep on with it. I wish all of you a Lent filled with Quiet and Growth in the love of God and our brothers and sisters. Always united in prayer and mission! Thanks for your prayers. María Augusta Pires, CLM in CAR * Gervelais is the name of a “little one” María Augusta referred to earlier on April 13 and June 11, 2018. ** Because the results of the students are not encouraging, as she explained in her last letter.

Chispuditos Program in the Village of la Salvadora, Santa Catarina Pínula, Guatemala

9 March, 2019 by Alberto de la Portilla

Comboni Lay Missionaries of the Province of Central America, Guatemala

Chispuditos is the name of the food given only to children taking part in the program, between the ages of six months to six years. The purpose of this product is to provide vitamins and minerals necessary for the integral development of the children, helping to strengthen their immunological system, and to avoid anemia and malnutrition. In Guatemala the program is working in various places, it is free, and it is sponsored by foreign benefactors.

How is it that we, the CLM_PCA of Guatemala know about Chispuditos?

This is the story as told by Ana Cris de Camey, who is currently a missionary in Brazil:

“The month of February, 2017 was the first time we reached the village of la Salvadora and, as part of our missionary activity, we started home visitations with the idea of getting to know the families and their needs. That is where we met María Mercedes and Walter. She was 24 and he was 37. They had seven children, the last two being twins, a boy and a girl, Fabián and Tania, who were severely undernourished, pale, without hair, with spots on their heads and with a severe rash. The worst part is that they could not sit up even though they were already one and a half year old.

María Mercedes said that she was taking them to the national hospital Roosevelt once a month, where they were being treated for chronic malnutrition, were giving them some milk products, but it was not enough for them. For certain it was a precarious and difficult situation for the mother, who had problems finding food for the children since her husband did not have a job and was not even looking for one. On top of that she was the victim of physical and verbal abuse.

On that same day in the afternoon, we talked with the community to find a way to help them because their situation was beyond deplorable. Miriam, also a CLM, commented about the Chispuditos program held at the clinic St. Daniel Comboni, run by Sr. Sarah Mulligan, SC.

Miriam spoke with Sr. Sarah and they allowed us to take up this nutrition program. Then several of us went to learn about the program to implement it at la Salvadora.

At first they lent us the scale to weigh the children and the ruler to measure their stature. After that and with the help of the parish of Santa Catarina Pínula, we were able to buy the equipment for our children.

On July, 8, 2017, for the first time we brought in the Chispuditos. On that same day we weighed 40 children, several of them healthy, while in others with malnutrition visible through their frail state and others too fat. By then we had already learned that this, too, was a sign of malnutrition.

We kept up the visits on the first Saturday of each month to measure and weigh the children, give them the Chispuditos, and giving encouragement to the mothers, besides teaching them some recipes to include protein and other ingredients that children need in order to grow.

Tania and Fabián:

Three months into the program, on October 2017, Fabián died. It was very tough because in all possible ways we were fighting to help these children escape malnutrition. They say that he gave a deep sigh and died. This was certainly due to the general weakness of his body and the heart gave up beating. We stayed close to María Mercedes and her family. She went to live with her mother and on various occasions we brought her the Chispuditos so that Tania would not stop taking it. Between the Chispuditos, the increased attention, the support of her grandmother and uncles, after two months we could already see the difference. She was a different girl, had a good color! She was a dark girl, with black hair, a great smile and a lot of energy! She was sitting up and was beginning to take her first steps. On that day I cried to see the mercy of God through this little girl. Unfortunately, her brother had to die, but it was not in vain. Today it gives us great joy to see the attention given to Tania, to be a different girl, that she may walk and grow.

As CLM we make every possible effort to help these women to grow spiritually and to better feed their families, and also that the children may escape malnutrition and have a better life. It involves years of work, but we know that already today we are beginning to see some fruit.”

Currently the program still works in the village la Salvadora, after one year and eight months, even though, having started with 40 children, we only have 12 still in it. Last Saturday, March 2, 2019, 11 new ones arrived. We rejoiced in our hearts, thanking God for all this. We have earned the trust of our community, and we hope these children will persevere and that the number of children benefiting from the Chispuditos will increase.

“Holy and capable, making common cause with the poorest and most abandoned”

St. Daniel Comboni

Lily Portillo

CLM-PCA, Guatemala

CLM Meeting in Nurember

7 March, 2019 by Alberto de la Portilla

The richness of the CLM groups is their variety

With still great vigor and enthusiasm Christoph, Fr. Günter and Barbara told us of how they experienced the general assembly of the CLM in Rome. It was great to be present and meet the CLM of the other 19 countries/provinces, to share and to pray together, to discover what is most useful in our future development and what steps are necessary or possible. The difference between the groups is great and it is at one and the same time a challenge and an enrichment. To be able to keep in touch by way of WhatsApp is marvelous. Barbara gave us a first introduction to the proposals of the assembly and then the group started examining the steps/decisions most important to us.

Pilgrimage of the CLM and the MCCJ

Bro. Hans, Fr. Günther and Willi gave us information over the pilgrimage we will have this coming September. Concrete proposals were made and have decided on the main points. There is room for 18 participants, registrations can be placed with Willi (CLM) or with Fr. Günther (MCCJ). After lunch we had enough time to enjoy the sunshine and walk around the lake of Wörther See.

Africa – A continent of Peace Initiatives

We gave a good amount of time to the continuation of our work connected to our peace project. The next step will be Bro. Hans’ conference at the peace center of Lindau. Together we prepared for him the basic idea and the methodology to be followed. The lecture will introduce the valuable experiences of the continent connected to activities of peace and reconciliation. The CLM will contribute a “Network of Places of Peace” (we shared the work for him).

Dynamics connected to Globalization

Christof was our guide in a better understanding the pro-active pedagogy connected to themes such as globalization and peace.

Humans are meant for joy – joy is meant for humans

At the end of the day we reflected on a theme prepared by Franz von Sales on the “joy of our faith.” Joy is our Godly inheritance – the only one that can give us happiness. Joy has such a strong connection with our heart, that it cannot be at peace without it. God created joy for our own wellbeing. With joy, we await our next meeting in May (3-5).

All who are interested, are welcome!

CLM, Germany

Prayer of the Comboni Family 2019 March

1 March, 2019 by Alberto de la Portilla

March – That the canonisation of Bishop Romero may bring all the Christian communities of Latin America strength, perseverance and confidence in the power of the Gospel. Lord hear us.