To be a community is to share what we are with others, is going to the peripheries.
In this video we share what we live in Villa Ecológica (Arequipa, Peru) and the work we do with the elderly, children, families and patients at a social and pastoral level.
See and know our way, what we are, where we are and with whom we are.
CLM Ayllu in Peru
Another activity of mission promotion was held on the weekend of April 20-22, this time in the parish of Vergada to which Sofía Coelho, who is going through her formation with us, belongs.
It was a very joyous weekend, as we were very much welcomed by the community and by the pastor, Fr. Antonio Machado.
We started our activities on Friday with the youth groups and the altar servers, then on Saturday we moved on with the catechesis of Saturday and the Eucharist on Saturday and Sunday where we had the participation of Fr. Francisco Medeiros, a Comboni Missionary in charge of the CLM in Portugal.
The weekends of mission promotion are always times of great enrichment, we enter into the life of the parish community where we speak of our experiences and try to share a little about mission, namely what we lived and felt in the places where we served.
They are times of sharing, that enrich us incredibly and make us feel that the love of Christ, the Good Shepherd, always lives in us and in those around us (even when we do not believe it is there).
We had the chance to perceive how this is a missionary parish open to others, to those who need it most, and it is not a closed in parish at all. And this is a great gift! These moments remind me that I, too, am a missionary in Portugal and, even though in a different way, this mission is as valid as the foreign mission.
During this weekend we also celebrated a vocation day and I am happy to be able to share my vocation as a CLM with the people I meet!
I also want to share with you how we were spoiled! Mrs. Rosa and Mrs. Sofía together with the pastor made sure we did not lack anything, we had good accommodations and the meals were luscious. I cannot forget the “crazy for Jesus (a youth group) and the catechists, who always supported us in everything we needed. Thanks from our hearts!
Sandra Fagundes, CLM
This road with the youth already has half a year and the truth is that every day we feel that it goes further. From the first days, their lives crossed with ours and from that moment, we decided that somehow we had to walk together.
The group was born and, although without a name, it has grown with the testimony of everyone’s life.
Now they take the helm. We plant a little of the seed that we bring inside and together we will see how it will bear fruit.
Paula and Neuza. CLM Arequipa
I share with you my morning scenery. It is the scenery of my city, Beautiful Leiria, which is now the background for my morning exercise where I also find God and converse with him. (…) We dialogue over what happened on March 4 in “my” parish of St. Euphemia – A solidarity Play presented by the Promotion Theater of St. Euphemia (TASE): A Comedy based on the Legend of Leiria.
I am very grateful to our Father. This Play trusted in Him. Many were the times when I felt inadequate. Many times my memory was going back to my Lenten resolution that I took up in a shemá prayer (these are prayers that take place in Leiria, where prominence is given to song and meditation prayer, following the methods of Taizé). To trust. Trust because “all I can in him who strengthens me” (Phil 4:13). Trust because “God never asks anything that he has not already given you.”
While I run, I relive the moments when I lost courage because things were not going as well as I expected. But may I want what God wants, and above all, that this event may bring the fruits necessary to the Lord’s work, to the mission in Arequipa (the Ayllu Project) and nothing more.
It is difficult to please everyone. I want to believe that all I did was for the Work of the Lord. After all, Jesus did not always please everyone. And how difficult it is to receive criticism (constructive or not) and accept it in silence. “I could have done a or b. Or perhaps I could have done c. Or perhaps d.” I ask for forgiveness for the less positive reactions I had towards those who, even though it was not clear to me, simply wanted to help. !And I owe them many thanks!
To take on this event in the name of the Comboni Lay Missionaries was life giving. Life was generated, not only in myself, but also through all human relationships, among the people who want to give of themselves. And through this believer’s vision I see a world where everyone (EVERYONE) is capable of love, we all have a MISSIONARY SOUL and, even though it may often be hidden, this need to love and to be loved. And this is the love that must be the engine of life!
During the weeks before the play we went around to invite people. Many said “I can’t,” some said “{ I won’t go, but I will buy a ticket,” others yet “ I don’t know if I will go,” I’ll go,” “After all, I can’t go.”
It was a mixture of highs and lows that were forming an audience. In reality, I was doubting whether the audience would have even been enough for the TASE. After all to act on a stage is much more fun and is done with more interest if the attendance is large and receptive. All things considered, I was praying that at least 50 people would fill the seats of the auditorium.
Trust Carolina. I kept on repeating it to myself.
If you could only understand the emotion of my heart when, on that Sunday afternoon that I had been waiting anxiously for so long, about 130 people showed up to see the play.
I cannot stop thanking those who were present and even those who were there in different way through prayer, spiritually, with their thoughts.
I am grateful also to TASE members who gratis and generously were making available their acting talents, making the audience roar with laughter, including myself laughing to tears.
I thank also the sponsors, some mentioned in the flyers and others who chose to remain anonymous. And above all, I thank God for the fruits of this Solidarity Play that, way beyond the financial aspect, are life-giving fruits in the relationships that were established, in the dialogue generated by doing it, in the thoughts that arose in the head of each cooperator when they decided to contribute.
Many thanks to all
Thanks from the bottom of my heart. And here many more “a thousand lives for mission” were born.
I am sure that, In all that we did, there was the hand of God and of our friend, San Daniel Comboni.
Carolina Fiúza, CLM
