Portugal – Page 23 – Comboni Lay Missionaries

Witnesses of a Common Journey

14 August, 2016 by Alberto de la Portilla

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!

Paula Sousa. Portugal

Family Feast, a celebration of love and life sharing

15 July, 2016 by Alberto de la Portilla

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.

Neuza Francisco (Portugal)

Welcome Élia!

9 July, 20167 July, 2016 by Alberto de la Portilla

On July 3 arrived at Lisbon airport the CLM Élia- She returns from the Central African Republic after five years of missionary service in the mission of Mongoumba.

After the reception at the airport from the CLM Pedro, Liliana and Flávio and sister Carmen, we went with great joy by to eat at the house of the Comboni Sisters in Olivais. In addition to the community of the Comboni sisters, where there were the Family of Pedro. During lunch, we talk and share mission´s adventures. It was a beautiful moment of conviviality. After lunch, there was still room for some delicious Welcoming´s cakes!

In the afternoon, Élia continued her way home in the Algarve, where she is now with her family.

We appreciate the availability of the Comboni Sisters and wish Élia a good return and readjustment to the reality of our country.

Welcome Élia!

Portuguese CLM

“Reasons of the Heart”

4 June, 2016 by Alberto de la Portilla

There are many reasons that make it throb.

But it is one, only one, the essence of the reasons, which sets the pace for all others “love”!

It is guiding our whole life.

But as human beings we are, and because more and more we live in a world of reason and for the reason, we see love as a chemical formula that we can handle according to our will.

The heart has its limits, we know!

We pull it down, we again turn it up and remove it afterward…

But is it have to be like that?! Can´t we learn? Can´t we be courageous? Can´t we believe?

Maybe, we just need a little courage, hope and faith!

Perhaps it will has no limit if we choose to face it, heal them, welcome them!

Perhaps the heart after all can be unlimited if we have the courage to decide that Love has no limits.

And if it is the passion of Christ in his pain for us, where we find the balm of mercy, we will heal our wounds immersing ourselves in His love!

It is not enough to ask, to thank, to pray!

It is mandatory to experience forgiveness in us and for us! Then to live on the other and for the other the joy of love…

Let us be a good legacy of his passion of open Heart, healthy and full of reasons for living…

Cristina Sousa

Maia, 27 May 2016

Times of change

1 June, 2016 by Alberto de la Portilla

On the 13^th, day of the Virgin of Fátima, began the changes in the Apostolic Community of Mongoumba, with Fr Maurice leaving to Rome, where he will take part in a training course to become a trainer of young people who want to be Comboni missionaries. Mary intercede for him to adapt well to his new community, where he will spend this period of training, and to give a good witness of faith and love to all who cross his path.

The 23th we had the joy of receiving Ana, young Polish CLM, she came from Kinshasa, where she has been learning French. We ask the Lord of the harvest to help us in this integration time for Anna to be an example of love, joy and compassion and service to the people we were sent.

Yesterday was the turn to arrive from Paris, where Fr. Fernando, from Mexico, was learning French. In these first months of his stay in Central Africa the Mongoumba apostolic community will grow, it will be where Fr Fernando will learn Sango. Where he will go afterwards, we do not know…

July will be again time of changing with the departure of Elia. The mission will run out a very strong plaster stone…! Will she return someday? That only God knows! For now, we can only be grateful from now, all the good she did for this people and this community. May the Lord accompany her, always.

A big hug to all CLM and especially to all those who have celebrated their birthdays.

Maria Augusta and Elia.

CLM CAR