This year three girls joined our polish CLM movement and are now officially Comboni Lay Missionaries.
Agnieszka, Ewelina and Marcela are currently doing their “life in a community” experience in Comboni father’s house in Cracow.
Soon, Ewelina and Agnieszka will go to Peru for 2 years’ mission, to Arequipa where they will replace Paula and Neuza.
Marcela will join the community in Mongoumba – Central Africa, where another polish CLM – Monika is currently working on the mission too.
These three months are filled with meetings with different people and learning life all together.
They have language classes (Spanish and French), meetings where they discuss and interpret God’s words for Holy Bible.
Ewelina and Agnieszka are volunteers in the family emergency and Marcela started her voluntary work at hospital.
As they say most of their free time they are spending on perfecting the languages, they will soon use very often and on talking with Comboni fathers, brother and themselves.
Let’s pray for them so they could be true witness of God’s love and mercy every day of their mission and their life in general.
January – That all the inhabitants of the earth may work to guard this common home which God entrusted to us so that future generations may also enjoy it. Lord hear us.
It is said that experience is the best teacher and for us as candidates undergoing formation to become Comboni Lay Missionaries, this was and is part of our learning process. The experience had been planned months prior with the selection of two candidates (Beatrice Imali, a nurse, and Angeline Njeri, a teacher) as the first of the group to experience missionary life and work in mission territories. The experience was to be led by our formator, Fr. Maciek Zielinski. The journey from Nairobi to Amakuriat Mission in West Pokot County started on the night of 2nd December 2019 with a slight detour to Kacheliba Parish for breakfast and little rest the next morning. We arrived at the Mission at around 1:30pm to a warm welcome from the entire community (both MCCJ and CMS) and the Provincial Superior of the MCCJ in the Kenyan Province, Fr. Austin Radol.
With Rev. Fr. Austin on our first night in the mission
After a goodnight’s rest, we embarked on our duties the following day as scheduled in the MCCJ Amakuriat Community’s calendar prior to our arrival. Beatrice started work at the dispensary in the mission ran by an amazing and hardworking Sr. Gabriella. Angeline embarked on a journey of youth formation and pastoral work in Amakuriat and other outstations within the Parish. The missionary experience meant to last for about three weeks had already began. This was later followed by the sharing of meals and hearty laughter with the community later in the day. Even on our first days there, we knew that the experience would be a wonderful one.
Angeline conducting youth formation at Chelopoy, an outstation
Josephine (joined us later) conducting youth formation at Kaakow, an outstation of Amakuriat Parish
It was important to not only be fully engaged in the work of the Comboni Family in Amakuriat Parish but to also observe and interact with the people and try to learn as much as we could about them. The intricate workings of a society and it’s culture serve as a great teacher to an aspiring missionary. In our engagements with them, we not only were able to pick few words here and there, but also got to experience their enriching faith and community as a people. The Mass was celebrated with joyful singing and it felt like everybody knew everybody.
Nevertheless, there never lacks challenges that one observes even on a day to day basis. Due to limited health facilities, the dispensary is always having patients streaming in. Some patients so sick that Sr. Gabriella has to rush them to Moroto, Uganda. The heaviness of the workload could be seen in the face of Beatrice, who though tired always expresses the joy she feels in serving the sick.
Youth formation not only enables you to engage with the youth, but also opens one’s eyes to the need for youth sensitization on personal growth and development, especially through education and spirituality. However, the society has still yielded great young men and women who have and are still working towards the betterment of themselves as individuals and as a community. This can be clearly seen by the youthful young men and women working in the dispensary, the youth and young children in schools and the various professionals within the schools and churches. The work of the Comboni Missionaries in this area can be clearly seen and continues to grow daily. But even then, a lot remains to be done. It is as the Lord put it, “The harvest is great but the laborers are few”. This puts into perspective the need for Comboni Lay Missionaries in not only Amakuriat Parish but in other missionary territories here in Kenya and the world as a whole.
Beatrice, Sr. Gabriella and the staff at the dispensary
Our formator, Fr. Maciek, has always insisted that it is important to also experience community life, albeit even for short periods at a time before basic formation is completed. In our short stay, we were able to see the beauty of harmonious living among community members, and the joy it brings to the mission. We felt at home and social interactions between us and the MCCJ and CMS community in Amakuriat were something we will live to treasure. We even got to celebrate Fr. Maciek’s and Beatrice’s birthdays, and our first international CLM Feast Day with the community!
Celebrating CLM feast day with the MCCJ community in Amakuriat
With the end of the experience drawing near, we knew that this was an experience we would relate to our colleagues once back in Nairobi. There is guaranteed nostalgia, and the desire to serve as Comboni Lay Missionaries has only been strengthened by this experience. We hope that our experience also inspires other CLM candidates to keep discerning and aspiring to engage in such rewarding and blessed work. We hope to be back someday. Until then, to the amazing West Pokot community, Keriama! (See you again).
One year after the general assembly in Rome and the greetings of Pope Francis we celebrated with the Comboni-Family the Comboni Lay Missionaries movement day together with volunteers in the global south and north, who decided to be inspired by Saint Daniel Comboni, strengthened by a movement of lay Christians and lifelong dedicated to spread the good news of the Gospel.
We started with a World-Cafe with statements from Pope Francis about mission today, mission in shrinking communities, mission in post-colonial Europe and in times of global climate change. Those arriving had the opportunity to comment on selected statements at several tables. The idea was to exchange ideas in several small groups at parallel tables.
Afterwards, a short video of the Pope’s greeting in Rome in December 2018 (compiled by Christina from Brazil) and the greeting of the Central Committee of the Comboni Lay Missionaries were read out partly as an introduction to the feast. It dealt with the reading of the third Advent and the joy with which the gospel is to be proclaimed as well as the growing together of the CLM nationally and internationally. The new international logo of the Comboni Lay Missionaries was presented. This was the result of a cooperative process last year and was selected from several proposals.
The word service was initiated by a “search order”. Those present were invited to collect various objects during a walk, from which a crib should then be designed. Thus, the current times and the past were brought together as well as aspects of global integration and injustice, pollution and mission today. The two MaZ-in-service, the returning MaZler *, the CLM international and the numerous Comboni friends, who had responded to the invitation but unfortunately could not be there, were included in the prayers.
The feast continued in the dining and living room. A “shepherd’s meal” was prepared there. This again illustrated the upcoming Christmas. Thanks to many helping hands, there was a delicious, social get-together, rounded off with cake and children’s Christmas punch (as two families brought their four children as well). During the evening and the following day, congratulations and pictures came from CLM celebrations in Mexico, Kenya, Guatemala, Portugal, Spain, Egypt, Italy and from Rome were shared live via WhatsApp while the feast.
CLM, Germany
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