Comboni Lay Missionaries

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Poland

Three months in London

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LondonThree months has lasted our experience in London, in this process of intensive training before leaving for mission, where we worked to improve our English, and where we could know each other better and walk among us as a Community.

It have been the last stage before traveling to Africa, Gulu (Uganda) and it’s been a time we live intensely, to confirm our vocation and to confirm ourselves in this way. Since we landed in March, (Monika, Ewa, Asia and me), we have shared joys, birthdays, walks on the “city”, cultural visits, prayers, moments of doubt, some moments of sadness, but a lot of conversation and laughter.

We have also shared our hopes, our experience of God and our desire to live in this world with an attentive and generous heart. We have begun to discover each other praying together, listening, wondering, watching and we all want to do so in African soil.

We felt welcomed and cared by the Community of Comboni Fathers who have helped us with the language and manage on this amazing city, making these months have passed quickly and without any difficulty.

With the ending of our English classes, our meetings and other activities with people from school, we have realized it was time to start saying goodbye.

Ends specific training, but we know that training always will continue wherever we´ll go, learning every day… and let God transform us slowly. We will try to be open to the Gospel and to evangelization trough others.

With a big smile we leave this country, another experience in the heart, and with our suitcase in hand we are now ready for the next destination…

LondonCarmen Aranda

Greetings from London

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LondonWe’d like to share our community life in London with you. Our first impression is very positive. The community is much opened and fathers are very helpful and polite. Of course, for them it’s a little strange situation having four young girls living with them. But they got used to live with us and us with them.

The most important thing is learning English in the Stanton School of English, but not only. It’s time for our community, so we learn how to live together and we learn from each other. Naturally we have our own timetable which includes our activities, e.g. meetings about Uganda, meetings about thing which are important and interesting for us. We also have meetings with the fathers about the Lent and different theological issues… We also try to have a community day. This is time for us, for common prayer, for adoration and for relax 🙂

The 15th of March we celebrated the birthday of St. Daniel Comboni. It was a big feast for our family, for fathers, sisters and lay people who live in London. Great day!!! We could feel like one big family. And Comboni sisters invited us for dinner. So last Sunday we could meet all sisters who live in London. Their community consists of 14 sisters, so it is really big. They shared their mission experiences with us and gave us many useful guidelines.

We are here just 3 weeks so we can’t say more. It’s a short general sharing to inform you that everything goes well. Although it’s a busy time, we are very glad that we are here.

Greetings and hugs from our community

I’m sending you…

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Among the many celebrations and important events that have recently experienced the Comboni Family, was also the official sending of father Maciej Zielinski, who finally is going in mission. He was responsible for the Comboni Lay Missionaries in Poland. Last Sunday Bishop Jan Piotrowski officially sent him and gave him his pastoral blessing for the time of missionary work. Father Maciej from January 1 officially belongs to the Province of Kenya, where he will spend the next few years, working and helping those who need it most.

The celebration of sending took place in his parish- in Tarnów, where family, friends, Comboni Missionaries and Comboni Lay Missionaries attained.

“If someone knows Christ cannot keep it for him or her, but must proclaim Him” – emphasized Bishop Piotrowski. Therefore, Maciek decided that he wants to share his experience of God with those who have not met Him yet, those who have not reached the Gospel yet.

Father Maciej was responsible for the animation of vocations and work with youth for the past few years in Poland. Looking at the number of young people involved in help for the missions, you can freely say that this stay was very fruitful. And although Father Maciej understood young people and you can see that was finding in this work, he still missed Africa, to work on the Black Continent. Now, finally, it fills. And although we are a little sad, we are happy with him.

Each of us owes much to Maciek. As Comboni Lay Missionaries Movement we want to thank you for the time and commitment to our Movement in Poland. For father Maciek kindled enthusiasm and love for the mission. We thank you for every smile, good word, because you were for us like a “father”. We could always come, talk and get a help and solution.

“If a missionary feels alone in the mission, it means that we are not a community, we are not the Church”- said during the homily Bishop Piotrowski. Prayer is very important in missionary work, because it makes you feel the unity of the whole Church and gives the feeling that we are a true community of believers. This call to pray for Fr Maciek, but also for the whole missionary work of the Church, let us will collapse deep in our hearts, and this request will not remain unanswered.

Polish CLM group

Training for Mission

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A week is not long so we have to take it with passion. Definitely my week in Poland gave a lot of success. This time I wanted to share with everyone about the training time with the international community that is about to leave for Uganda.

We spend three intensive days (morning, afternoon and evening) for training. It was not easy to perform this training in English as it is not the mother tongue of any of us and it needs to be perfected a bit before leaving for mission (they will do so in London from March). However there is no big obstacle when there is will, so we set off. Soon we get the dictionaries of Spanish, Polish and English to succeed in the right word and the mutual aid came immediate. At the end we made it possible (although the head asked for rest at the end of the day for the effort but it was worthy).

I think it was a nice, interesting and necessary week. As the great family that we are, we feel all responsible for this community preparing to break new ground and I think it was important to take time to accompany them. This training time was a time to dialogue and share what it means to be CLM, our vocational call and the dreams that we have as missionaries. To all these ideals that are important to talk before leaving as a community, we added them a good time of deepening and more “professional” learning of our stay and service in the Mission.

To fix the pillars of this community we worked all morning and part of the afternoon of the second day in them, providing all our expectations and confronting specific experiences, doubts and dreams of other CLM.

Then we talked about the importance of inculturation, the knowledge of others and of ourselves to not move European models and to give the time and space to the other, lest we fall into the trap of transferring our solutions to others but to help each person, each people, may have its own voice and find their own solutions.

The last day we talked a little about the importance of approaching and knowing reality in depth, listen and silence a lot to understand well and have enough time to share our lives, knowing first the new environment and its people (what makes up their identity).

And finally ended up talking about our beloved Comboni and what it meant for each of us, the challenges posed to us for being Comboni Missionaries, the style, methodology, passion and commitment of which we are inheritors and debt fidelity. All this things as CLM and as Comboni Family. We want this to be our reference, also there in Gulu (Uganda) where we aim to work from the community, from the Comboni family and from the reality and needs of the people, open to learn every day and contribute the best of ourselves.

Personally it was a very rich time, which also allowed me to better understand this community and strengthen bonds.

I hope they always feel sheltered by all of us. They are sent throughout the movement and as such we will be supporting them.