Central America – Page 7 – Comboni Lay Missionaries

Mission promotion… all the way to Brazil

7 September, 2018 by Alberto de la Portilla

Dear CLM the world over. With great enthusiasm we share the experiences that lately have filled our hearts with joy, fraternity, unity and energy.

We, the Guatemalan Comboni Lay Missionaries of the Province of Central America, are happy to be involved in the process of commissioning the first missionaries of our community, who are about to leave for a foreign land. They are, as perhaps you already know, our brothers Alejandro and Ana Cris Camey Figueroa who, with their four young children, will soon go to Brazil.

It has been a great adventure for our Guatemalan community, since it is our first experience of this kind. It means that we all feel like we are all going to be sent, and lately we have actively taken part in the search for benefactors, in mission promotion activities in communities and parishes, and above all, we have joined our creativity, talents and efforts to organize the sale of artifacts we made with our own hands, using recyclable material.

We have been producing baskets, bottle-holders, flower pots, dolls, jewelry boxes, candy jars, crucifixes and other things, by recycling paper, cardboard, cans and plastic bags.

As a community, we thank God for all these opportunities stemming from the mission journey of the Camey family, because it has motivated us to get together and become active, thus discovering that together we are a source of mutual support. We have become much more conscious also of the love we share for mission in the style of St. Daniel Comboni.

We wish to see Jesus proclaimed all over, especially in those places where no one wants to go!

Blessed be God!

St. Daniel Comboni, pray for us.

CLM Guatemala

Second Meeting of Mission Promotion Guatemala-El Salvador

7 July, 2017 by Alberto de la Portilla

On Friday, June 30 we, members of the CLM-PCA of Guatemala were sent to El Salvador by our community.

The first meeting took place in December 2016. On that occasion in our mission promotion we shared about St. Daniel Comboni, the members of the Comboni family, the CLM, how we are organized and, at least a little bit, how in Guatemala the community followed a journey based on the indications of the directory.

On this second occasion, the mission promotion part took place on Saturday, July 1 and lasted from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

These were the points of our program of activities:

To go back to recognize St. Daniel Comboni, the Comboni family and the charism that identifies us;

The missionary vocation and how to be community in the Comboni style;

The directory and an explanation of the stages of human, spiritual and Comboni formation. At the same time, as an example, how we took care of our formation over two and a half years;

A small workshop on human development to end the day and to explain a little bit the role of the CLM in the field of the integral development of the person.

Results of the meeting:

Identification of and connection among the people who will be the contacts between Guatemala and El Salvador;

Several people were motivated to know better the Comboni charism in order to discern their vocation;

To start having meetings the last Saturday of each month, beginning now in July;

From our part, a commitment to nurture properly and periodically the seed that has been planted;

To pray for fruits and for our brothers of El Salvador.

We, the CLM of Guatemala, believe in the name of Jesus and with the intercession of St. Daniel Comboni, that this work is from God and will have success. The people of El Salvador are intelligent, fighters, lovable, accessible, open and, above all and most importantly, full of faith and of love of God and ready to serve the most needy.

This past weekend, we, from Guatemala, without any merit on our part, have enjoyed and shared in the mercy of God.

“THE MISSIONARY MUST AT TIMES BE HAPPY WITH SOWING A SEED THAT WILL GIVE FRUIT WITH THE MISSIONARIES WHO WILL FOLLOW.”

St. Daniel Comboni

COMBONI LAY MISSIONARIES OF THE PROVINCE OF CENTRAL AMERICA

“HOLY AND CAPABLE MAKING COMMON CAUSE WITH THE POOREST AND MOST ABANDONED.

St. Daniel Comboni

Mission Promotion by CLM of PCA

6 June, 2017 by Alberto de la Portilla

…”Holy and capable, making common cause with the poorest and most abandoned” (St. Daniel Comboni)

The CLM of the PCA in Guatemala started a new missionary experience. It concerns mission promotion in the parishes of the city.

We share here the first experience which took place on May 11, 18, 21 and 25.

It took place in the church of St. Rita, in the parish of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart. We did mission promotion with the mission pastoral team of the parish. They are a group of people who ardently desire to proclaim Jesus in the areas of their neighborhood and, by so doing, to be a “Church reaching out,” as Pope Francis is constantly asking. They are beginning to plunge into this beautiful adventure of meeting those who have no desire to approach the Church, in order to encourage them and to invite them and to speak to them about Jesus and of what he has done in their lives.

This is why they asked for our help.

For us it was the first time to have this type of experience and we felt very grateful to God, because he had already been at work in their hearts and we served as instruments in encouraging them not to be afraid to venture out.

We had the opportunity to share our personal witness of our encountering Jesus, together with our experiences in home visits, in the mission we currently exercise in the parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, located in the red light district of the capital, and on the community life we share here as CLM.

We also explained to them who we are, our identity and charism, with the objective of raising lay vocations. Blessed be God.

“My missionaries must constantly keep their eyes fixed on Jesu Christ, loving him tenderly and striving to understand always better what it means to have a God who died on a cross for the salvation of the world.” (St. Daniel Comboni)

CLM Guatemala

A Missionary Holy Week in El Salvador

31 May, 2017 by Alberto de la Portilla

…”Holy and capable, making common cause with the poorest and most abandoned” (St. Daniel Comboni)

We, the CLM of the PCA in Guatemala, want to share with joy the mission experience Mercedes Suy and Carolina Lorenzana had during Holy Week, on April 8-16 of this year.

They went to the parish of St. Anthony in Santa Tecla, El Salvador and this is their story:

On Saturday, April 8, at 6:00 a.m. we left Guatemala City for El Salvador. The bus trip lasted six and a half hours. We arrived at 12:30 p. m. and we were met at the bus station to be taken to the parish of St. Anthony where Fr. Juan José Hernández, mccj welcomed us and gave us lodging. In the afternoon we went to meet the community of San Rafael. That was our mission field.

On that same day we started the home visits that lasted through the week until Thursday. We visited many families where we told them about the CLM, and that we were from Guatemala. They listened to us with interest, but above all we listened about their needs, problems and illnesses. After a few days, another community called San José del Pino requested our presence,

We took part in the activities of the small community sharing the Word at the House of Prayer “Oratorio,” and we attended the Way of the Cross in both communities.

These are people who have been directly affected by the gangs and by juvenile delinquency. Many have relatives or friends who disappeared or were killed. These communities need a person to person mission, where they can be helped to rise beyond their many problems by giving them skills to work with, social assistance and a deep evangelization with continuing support.

Perhaps the mission was not great, but it was rich in missionary activity. We, the CLM of the PCA in Guatemala will continue to hold these missionary experiences ad gentes in order to nurture our CLM charism.

CLM Guatemala

Missionary Exhibit and Meeting in Guatemala

9 April, 20176 April, 2017 by Alberto de la Portilla

“Saints and able, making common cause with the poor and the needy” (St. Daniel Comboni)

We, the CLM of the PCA in Guatemala want to let you know that on the Saturday, April 1, organized a mission exhibit and a meeting at Casa Comboni, Guatemala. We joined with the missionaries of the parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, with whom, since February 2016, we are cooperating in their missionary formation.

The parish is St. Catherine of Alexandria is in Santa Catarina Pinula, a municipality of the department of Guatemala City, located about 10 miles from the capital.

In some areas, this population is subjected to extreme poverty and crime because of the gangs, It is one of the “red Zones” of the city.

The objective of our activity was to invite the Comboni Missionaries living in Guatemala city so that their two communities, the CLM and the “missionaries of Catherine (as we call them with affection)would share with words and through visual aids, some of the experiences of 2016 and the missionary projects we have in store for 2017.

We enjoyed the presence of the Comboni Missionaries Fr. Pasquale Miniero, Fr. Carlos Rodríguez, Fr. Antonio Maria Bruyel, Fr. Vicente Clemente and, of course, our moderator Bro. Humberto Rua. The one who thought up this event was also present: Fr. Walter Santizo, a Guatemalan diocesan priest and the pastor of St. Catherine of Alexandria.

At the end we shared a delicious lunch.

The basic idea by which the CLM of the PCA in Guatemala started this year is” “Saints and able united in a common cause to help the poorest and most needed.” This is how St. Daniel Comboni wants his missionaries to be.

We trust in Providence and entrust ourselves to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, just as St. Daniel Comboni taught us to do. God always walks ahead of us, shedding light on the path leading to the most needy.

CLM Guatemala