Comboni Lay Missionaries

Christmas in the Central African Republic

LMC en RCA

LMC en RCA

From Bangui, the capital of uneasiness, where interests and their cohorts mix with the daily life of men and women, boys and girls, who constantly brighten with a smile and their sweet disposition the unpaved, potholed streets shaped by the disorganized traffic of cars, trucks, tanks, jeeps, motorbikes, etc.

I know that this is a time for speaking of love, even if there is no time to love, or to lose, or to count, or to register.

The truth is that – and I am not the only one – I am beginning to feel saturated with words! There is an urgency to live by this Love we so much talk about, to allow us to be transformed by Him, to breathe him in! We cannot continue to filter what our hearts do not want to see! I am currently experiencing a Love which is upside down, because it turns my innards upside down!

I am in mission, or better, we are all in mission, living is mission, called to be responsible for ourselves, for others, for all that surrounds us. We are the chosen people to carry the Breath of God. We cannot snuff the Breath that makes us live, because without it we die, or better yet, we are not even born!

This is a country shining like a gem because of its greed, and where children are the most precious wealth. They scream at us with their precious breath: “Allow us to live.”

LMC en RCA

With much love

Merry Christmas

CAR

Cristina Sousa, CLM

 

News from Piquiá, Brazil

LMC Brasil

LMC BrasilGreetings friends, hoping you are all well.

We are fine and quite happy, because yesterday was a very special day. Piquiá de Baixo scored another victory, because we finally signed the contract of the second phase of the project of resettlement that makes it possible to begin the building of the new neighborhood. The joy of the moment was contagious and with laughter, hugs and tears hope was revived.

September 17 will remain impressed in our hearts as the day when a dream came closer to becoming reality and, while the journey is still long, people will continue to fight for their rights.

It was a very symbolic day for us, because it coincided with the memorial of Bishop Franco Masserdotti, a Comboni Missionary who was very active in Balsas, a city in the south of Maranhão. He witnessed with his life marked by the defense of human rights and of indigenous people, protecting the family and social justice. He always insisted that, besides giving the poor a fish and teaching them how to fish, it was necessary “to clean the river” contaminated by social injustice.

We thank you for your prayers. Let’s keep in touch.

Liliana and Flávio, CLM Brazil

We let you here a video to contextualize the reality of this people

 

Spanish CLM in Radio Maria

Radio Maria

Radio MariaGreetings to everybody

We leave you here the extracts where the CLM appear in yesterday’s program “Church in mission” that the CALM (Coordinator of Associations of Lay Missionaries of Spain) has organized in Radio Maria.
In it, we have an interview with our colleague Xoancar who is in Piquiá (Brazil):

 

News about our next international assembly, that we will celebrate in Rome in December:

 

And the testimony of Carmen Aranda about her time in Gulu (Uganda):

Hope you enjoy it
Many thanks to the CALM and Radio Maria for carrying out this beautiful work of raising awareness about the missionary laity.

 

Logbook of Simone from the RCA

Simone Mongoumba

Hi to everyone. How are you doing? I hope you are well. Here the rainy season has begun and, to move around, we could use Noah’s ark. When it rains in Mongoumba, everything stops (I believe the same happens throughout the RCA), the children and the teachers do not come to school, you do not see anyone around and we could sleep all day long, lulled by the sound of the rain, and think of you in Portugal, Poland, Italy, all over the world. Mission has its pros and cons.

ESPERGESIA

I was born on a day
when God was sick.

Everyone knows that I live,
that I’m evil; and they don’t know
about the December of that January.
Since I was born on a day
when God was sick.

There’s a void
in my metaphysical air
that no one must feel:
the cloister of a silence
that spoke on the edge of a fire.

I was born on a day
when God was sick.

Brother, listen, listen…
Alright. And may I not go
without bringing Decembers,
without leaving Januaries.
Since I was born on a day
when God was sick.

Everyone knows that I live,
that I chew… and they don’t know
why there’s a squeal in my verse,
the dark uncertainty of a coffin,
from polished unrolled winds of the inquisitive
Desert Sphinx.

Everyone knows… And they don’t know
that the Light is consumptive,
and the Dark fat…
And they don’t know that the mystery encapsulates
that it’s the musical
and sad hunched back that denounces from a distance
the meridian step from the boundaries to the Boundaries.

I was born a day
when God was sick,
gravely sick.

(César Vallejo)

Simone Mongoumba

In this deep, thick, foreboding, sticky, penetrating, often desolated and discomforting night that envelops the entire Republic of Central Africa, there is lightning of blinding light lasting but an instant. It is the lightning of rifles, of shooting, of grenades followed by an awesome noise… and lightning of ESPERGESIA, lightning GENERATING HOPE.

In Bangui, in the neighborhood called Kilometro 5, in the parish of Our Lady of Fatima where I spent 45 days studying Sango, on May 1, feast of St. Joseph the Worker, during Mass, there was the lightning of weapons, shooting, of weapons, of grenades. It was a well-planned attack by people who want to see the night last forever. There were 16 victims.

We immediately perceived that the rumbling of the thunder of this explosion resounded around the world (someone even wrote to us from Brazil), we have felt the warmth of your nearness. We are OK. We were not direct witnesses. They tell us that slowly the situation is getting back to “normal.” In fact, that is how it is. After the lightning of weapons we have gone back to living in an even darker night.

Simone Mongoumba

In Mongoumbua there is lightning of ESPERGESIA, lightning GENERATING HOPE, infinitesimal, but of a blinding light: our visits to the Pygmies camps; Tuesday morning with the babies of the nutrition center; Sundays in the chapels for prayer with the community, sharing a bit of cassava and some small fish caught just for us; the Thursday meetings with a vocation group; the afternoons spent to draw and color; the endless hikes surrounded by cheering children; and the little newly born Pygmies, bundles looking at you with half open little eyes, who seem to tell you: “I was born on a day when God was sick, very sick,” butif I was born in this infernal night, there is still…

ESPERGESIA

Greetings, a hug and a kiss, prayers and THANKS

Simone CLM

My school

CLM Ethiopia

I’m about to go back to Poland from my mission in Ethiopia. A great part of my service was teaching children in two kindergartens. I taught them English. The schools belong to the Missionaries of Charity (Sisters of Mother Teresa of Calcutta). The first year of my teaching I was more focus on learning than teaching. I observed what other teachers were doing. I simply used to go to school and teach the children what came to my mind or what I found in the Internet. First year sometimes I was really frustrated with the situation in the school, especially with the attitude of the teachers. Some of the teachers prefer to sit all the class doing nothing, while the students repeat alphabet 100 times and even don’t recognize the letters. I could give many examples like this.  I tried to talk to the coordinator of the schools and later also to the Sisters. However none of them hoped to change anything. They knew how they work, they tried to talk to them, to organize a training with psychologist, but nothing has changed.

CLM Ethiopia

However I still wanted to work with them. Last year I started to organize teachers’ training every other week (one Friday in one school, the next week in the another school). Before every training I had to prepare some materials. I learned a lot to be able to share this knowledge with others. I still worked with the children, however at the beginning I prepared the English program for the whole year. I included many games, songs, various techniques and activities so the children had more fun and were motivated to study. Even when I didn’t have a lesson, the teachers should still follow the program and report what they did. I changed my schedule to be able to have similar number of lessons per week with each group in both schools.

I wish I could change something, especially the attitude of the teachers. I’ve learned one very important thing about motivation. Those who daily struggle to satisfy the basic needs of them and their families usually are not motivated to serve others, to do the good work for the society. Somehow it is psychologically justified. Only God can give the motivation beyond that. Some of the teachers really care for the children and their future, for the efficacy of their teaching. I’m sure that it’s God’s influence.

CLM Ethiopia

If the teachers don’t have any motivation coming from inside then they might be motivated from outside. That’s why I’m struggling now to arrange the implementing of the new evaluating system. Up to now, all the workers are very free to do what they want because there are no many consequences of that. If they work hard or are lazy, nothing changes. So now first of all, I’m trying to  encourage the coordinator and the Superior Sister to prepare the new system and implement it.

My work at school was evoluting while I was also developing my knowledge, skills and way of understanding. I know that the most important was not the knowledge I shared with the students or the teachers, but my presence. I’m aware that the children are too little to remember the English vocabulary in the near future. But surely they will remember me as someone who gave them joy and love. If I managed to teach the teachers something useful then it would be for the good of the children. The attitude is the most difficult to change. If there is a little improvement, I give the glory to God, because only He is able to renew the people’s heart.

My presence in the schools was a great lesson to me. I learned a lot not only about the profession of teacher and methodology, but also about the culture, about the people, their needs, their thoughts. Now I can understand them better. I know my perspective is different. I’m not frustrated anymore. I don’t judge them. I tried my best. The rest of the work I leave to God.

So… Who have learned more: the students, the teachers or I? I would say that I… But God knows… I think we all have learned something.

CLM Ethiopia

Magda Fiec, CLM Ethiopia