Comboni Lay Missionaries

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Formation

Witnesses of a Common Journey

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Marisa LMC

On August 7 of this year 2016 in Viseu, Vila Nova do Campo, we celebrated the missioning of the CLM Marisa Almeida with a Mass presided over by Bishop Ilídio Leandro in the parish church of Vila Nova do Campo.

José Tolentino Mendonça says: “With a friend at your side, no journey will be too long.” This journey made together with the CLM seems to have started yesterday. It feels like yesterday when I started it with Marisa, the CLM whom we gift with “all that we are.” To have known Marisa has been one of the greatest treasures that this journey has given me. Just like in this Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus came to repeat once more: “Do not be afraid.” He knows us. He knows our deepest fears, our anxieties, our obstacles and the wounds we need to heal. But, in the face of all this, he repeats: “Do not be afraid.” Often, so very often, we are fixated on our weakness, our fears and our insignificance. Many times we repeat by words and by the way we live” “Lord, I am so small, sinful, weak and helpless.” And he continues to repeat to us: “Do not be afraid.”

This is what happens to you. It happens to me and the same happens to Marisa. Many were the times when silently each one of us asked: “I? me? My God! With all the people who are daring and courageous, you pick me?!” Very often we have thought of not being up to it. But he does not choose the able ones, but enables those he chooses. It is to us, frail and sinful, that God gives the Kingdom of Heaven. This was the treasure I found in the CLM and that all of you are invited to follow and discover in life: Love. Love is what keeps us here. Love is what sends us out. And when we dare to follow, share and live this love, we are and we experience a bit of the Kingdom that the Father has prepared for us in Heaven. He puts us on his journey and for this we are here.

But I am not alone. None of us lives in solitude. Marisa does not exist for herself. We are together as I often say. And this being together is going with her, even though we are oceans apart.  It is because she experienced and felt this love that Marisa answers the call with a YES. She makes mistakes, like the rest of us. She falls, like us. She is afraid, like us. But in her heart she listens to Jesus who tells her: “Do not be afraid.” And she trusts in him enough to say YES with her life.

We go with her, stay with her and are missionaries with her. Mission is accomplished by the feet of those who go, the knees of those who pray and the hands of those who help. By doing this, we stay together. United we experience the love of God.

At this point, I thank the entire Comboni Family, present through the Comboni Missionaries of the Heart of Jesus, the Secular Comboni Missionaries, the Comboni Sisters and the Young in Mission, to the entire community and to all those who are close to her, physically and spiritually – you turned this moment an experience of love, a bit of heaven. Let us feel challenged, like her, to trust in God by answering YES to his invitation to love. “To think of a loving person is to pray for her,’ says St. Teresa of the Child Jesus. For this reason I invite each one of you to think of Marisa so that her mission may be rich and fruitful!

Do not be afraid, let us stay united!
Marisa LMC
Paula Sousa. Portugal

 

Vocation promotion in Ghana

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CLM Ghana

The Institution In My Father’s House built by a Comboni Missionary is having its aim to show the love of God to the poor and marginalized. For this, almost every year new entrances are carried on while others have to leave for further studies either to continue the Senior High School or to move to a Tertiary Institution. The clm aspirants living within the premises of the Institution see it good to widen the horizon of all those who are under formation within the premises of the Institution. It is for that matter, we are planning to start a Vocation Group to tackle the issue. But before this, we met to reflect upon our role as “clm.” Apart from our various services, we thought of doing something special to identify ourselves as clm. We are very much involved in the activities of the house but we want now to be more focused on our identity as clm and following the charism of St Daniel Comboni. We continue the reflection to select a special service at IMFH in addition to the Promotion of Vocation.

In this sense, we invited a Scholastic to present a topic upon Vocation this 17th July.

In his presentation, he explained the word vocation and demonstrated the kind of vocation we have in the Bible. The amazing part was his own experience up to the end of his third year of Theology. He concluded on the need of faith and prayer to journey with the Lord. Justin Nougnui, the coordinator of the clm group helped the Scholastic for the translation. In addition to what the Scholastic said, he drew the attention of the children and all those who were at the presentation on seriousness and academic performance. It is so important to be serious and concentrated before you reach a target, and also we cannot do away academic performance if we want to say yes to God’s calling. He then motivated the children to focus on their study if they want to do great things in life.

Justin Nougnui

Family Feast, a celebration of love and life sharing

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LMC Portugal

It is exactly like the title says: An experience of the unconditional love that unites us, that allows us to get close, to share in prayer and in community.

A new weekend, a new gathering and a new meeting again. On this weekend a new year of formation came to an end, a year filled with smiles, tears, discoveries, love, joy, friendship and a deep discovery of our own selves and of our relation with God. It was a year filled by God and by his merciful love for all of us.

In those eternal beginnings there was space for meditating, space to reflect over the different moments, the different instants that built up each of the weekends we experienced. We had time to share with those who during the whole year gave of their best for us and with us, such as the coordinator, and what it means to have our own individual experience of God, lived in the bosom of the Comboni Family.

They were two days for sharing the best of ourselves, the best of what God gives us freely as a gift – life.

During this weekend, as a family, we prayed, shared, were ourselves and allowed others to be, we laughed often, wished for peace, we were loving and living witnesses of the joy of the Gospel.

Between the laughter of the children and the wrinkles of experience, we gave thanks to God for each and every one who was present, for those who were absent, even though present in our hearts, for we were more than just those present, we were the Comboni family, spread across the four corners of the globe.

It was an extraordinary experience to witness the love of Christ present in each of the members of the family as they arrived, the gaze of a father and a mother bringing us closer. A family gathered to celebrate one of God’s greatest gifts, family. And so it was as a family that we allowed space and time for God to talk to each one of us by way of all those who shared in his joy.

Through the testimony of Márcia Costa we came close to the missionaries spread across the world, who proclaim with their lives the Gospel of Jesus. With the announcement of the departure of Marisa Almeida we were all touched by the blessing that her life among us has meant for us, and by her abandonment in the arms of God and in the motherly gaze of Our Lady, mother of mission.

To be a Comboni Lay Missionary is in itself to be family, a family that welcomes, helps, protects, that sows God-given seeds, that sees them grow and see the light, and bears fruit. It is a family that prays and shares, that grows and helps to grow, that nurtures and gives life. It is like a gaze that does not forget, a flower losing its petals, it is simply us.

To be a Comboni Lay Missionary means being nearer to God’s love and give living witness with our own lives.

It is good to be family with all of you.

LMC Portugal

Neuza Francisco (Portugal)

 

2 new members of Polish CLM comunity!

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Adela e TobiaszOn 3 June – in Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ Day, 2 new members officialy  joined our polish CLM comunity. During the High Mass, Adela and Tobiasz formally showed their desire to follow their missionary vocation in Saint Daniel Combioni’s Spirit. They read their declarations among Comboni Fathers, friends and invited guests. They were thankful for faith, God’s presence in their life and for their vocation. Together, they underlined that because of their married love, they want to be a sign of God. As a comunity, we would like to thank God for Adela and Tobias and we pray for them so they were able to trust him with courage and let Him lead them. First step on this Comboni’s path is just behind them 🙂