Comboni Lay Missionaries

Mission is not an experience, but LIFE

LMC Peru

LMC Peru

Perhaps the perception we have of ourselves down here has lessened due to the greatness of the world to which we feel we are called. Perhaps, a little at the time, we have let go off things to hold on to the world, the people, and love. Already we have nothing. Nothing is ours. There is nothing that cannot be given, shared with all those who walk side by side with us. It is a lot that we are not alone, and that all that we have is shared not only among ourselves, but with the world. We are part of a whole that only has meaning in the daily sharing and the life we have and we know is joined to others.

The scenery reflects the grandiosity of our interior, the grandiosity of the little miracles of which we are only spectators, as being the grain planted in fertile soil, we are channels of meaningful life. It is not just us, but we are more than the sum of the parts. We are from God. We are his instruments, his hands, his feet, and his embrace. We are imperfect and wounded, in a world full of sorrow and suffering where in love we dare to sow the paradise of God’s love.

LMC Peru

Each morning we go out to meet the others, out of the comforts we have, of what is ours, we go to meet love. We go, hoping that on every street and at every corner we will always have two arms to help people grow with us. We are nothing, but in our humble state we are what is truly existing within ourselves. We cannot even count the lives that have already crossed ours, nor the number of smiles, tears and hugs we have shared in the simplicity of a home’s front steps. This is how it is, love deprived of superficiality, integral without color or race, simply being. And we are called daily to let it be and grow.

Each day we give our life without plans nor schedule. We offer ourselves. Many are the times when we feel that it is God himself who calls us at the door through many faces, many personal histories and people. We are available to the love aimed at us, which calls us at each moment. We are open to the call of Jesus who calls us daily.

LMC Peru

We are soil open to care for others and to the possibility of growing hand in hand in Jesus’ journey. We are the cross carried on the shoulder and arms of others who are lost and cannot walk. It is not easy. We know by our own lives that it is not easy. But this is the only way it has a meaning for us.

Mission is life, our life, their life and the life we accept and give by proclaiming a Gospel living in each one of us. With each step we are witnesses of a Jesus who wants to live in the simplicity of our hearts. It is in recognizing ourselves as family that, in each day, in each visit we offer ourselves and grow.

The soil is barren and the mountains around us are often the way home for many. Protected by the imposing presence of the Misti and the Chachani, holding to our walking sticks, we cross the limits of what we can see and off we go looking for the face of God among those farthest away. We climb and descend mountains, following contorted paths. We go beyond the physical limitations of our bodies that often demand rest. We have gone beyond our limits, in the certainty that He is our strength and our life. With the certainty that ours is the mission of carrying him and of announcing him where He already is, where His seed is already there, where God already exists, where the only thing missing is that he be remembered, named and proclaimed. We go beyond our peripheries to the peripheries of the world to be the symbol of life, of love, of Him.

LMC Peru

We do not have much. We live simply and humbly among the people of God. In the simplicity and poverty of the life we lead is the treasure in vessels of clay of our hearts: the love of God.

It is good, very good, to allow ourselves to be moved by all who have become part of our history. It is good to be a shoulder of support, to be a place of refuge, to be Neuza and Paula just as we are, and share in simplicity this gift of our life. And to help others to discover the gift of their own. We belong to what is brought to us, to those who go off, and to those who come and to all those we leave along the way. Step by step we discover mission, we are mission. We belong to a mission which is not ours, but belongs to the One who daily sends us to love more.

We are part of the Comboni’s thousand lives for the mission. Together, we rediscover new Africas, new peripheries. Ours is not a little bit, the flatlands of comfort. We go. Together we go beyond the mountains, beyond even ourselves. Together we go to meet new peripheries, where we have not yet been and have not yet reached. If you only knew, if we knew how many Africas are left to discover, how many peripheries are there thirsting for God, for his love and for the miracle of love, which is the Eucharist. This is why we are here. For this we go to this meeting of love turning our lives into mission.

In our daily prayer we discover the path to be followed, the beauty of an unending mission, without borders, without limits. He is the limit. Actually, he does not have any. We move forward in the certitude that we are not alone because we find his arms at every dawn and at the end of day. We walk knowing that we always arrive where he is waiting for us. No matter how long the day will be and the life histories we meet and involve us, often including the tears we share. Yes, Lord, here we are, takes us where you want us to be. And even if life takes us far from here, we are Peru in the same love that brought us here and binds us as sisters and brothers to the end.

From Peru with love,

LMC Peru

Neuza Francisco and Paula Ascenção, CLM

Twenty one years of life, and “life in abundance”

LMC Portugal

LMC PortugalThis is the day to thank the Lord for what we have accomplished as Comboni Lay Missionaries. Today we celebrate 21 years of history and mission, 21 years from that January 25, 1998 when we started this journey of discernment and formation for lay people in Maia, animated by the Holy Spirit and by St. Daniel Comboni.

It has been a very beautiful journey done at the foot of the Cross, before the Lord. And it is from this journey that mission is born – the one made of God’s works that “are born and grow at the foot of the Cross.” It consists in walking as a family, inspired by St. Daniel Comboni who leads us to “Save Africa with Africa” – this marvelous Africa that today no longer has borders and stands at our peripheries.

LMC PortugalMany journeyed with us. Some left, others continue their commitment as CLM, but all, one way or the other, left swirls and drops that today make up this ocean of love we have become and binds continents together. We are grateful from the bottom of our hearts to all those who accompanied us and who keep on doing it.

LMC PortugalDuring these 21 years, many were the CLM who lived their missionary vocation in places beyond our borders: in Mozambique, Brazil, the Central African Republic and Peru. Today, we continue to share our missionary spirit in these same countries: Marisa in Mozambique; Liliana in Brazil; Maria Augusta and Cristina in the Central African Republic; Paula y Neuza in Peru. Not to mention all those who remain committed in Portugal, in the peripheries, in their families, in daily life, attempting to live the mission God has given them, plus all the candidates trying to discern God’s call for them in Comboni’s charism.

Missionaries in Christ and through our baptism, we move forward as St. Daniel Comboni inspired us: “Keep your eyes always fixed in Christ, loving him tenderly and trying to understand always better what it means to have a God dead on the cross for the salvation of souls.” (Writings 2721)

LMC PortugalAnd this saving of souls in Comboni was going well beyond simple evangelization: the salvation of humankind through the passion and death of Christ, which is born and lives through the identification of the missionary with this paschal mystery, in this dying in order to be born and live. “If the grain of wheat falling in the ground does not die, it remains alone, but if it dies, it produces abundant fruit.” (John 12:24)

With great enthusiasm let us continue our journey, following the footsteps of St. Daniel Comboni, hand in hand so that his work will not die, a journey of a difficult and enthusing mission among the people and the countries thirsting for Christ.

LMC PortugalCLM Portugal

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

 

This Christmas

Navidad LMC Peru

Navidad LMC Peru

I still remember the moist smell of Christmas, the heavy dress, the bright lights, a reflection of the inner state of those who live for a spirit of greater love.

Here it’s summer and the sun brightens the magic of the smiles and of the tears shared during visits and the invitations to stay a little longer. The sun burns the landscape and highlights the humanity of a people not forgotten but rather a fighter, it shines on the heart and soul of all those who welcome me, of all those who visit.

Here I do not smell the evergreens or the smoke from lighted chimneys. Here we have the scent of humble human beings who share with you all that they have. I am surrounded by people who, by the witness of their lives, help mine grow and grow closer as we are nearer to God. It is the smell of expectation and hope that tomorrow, even with its difficulties, will be much better than today, coupled with a strong will to move forward, with a smile. It smells like a kitchen where folks are not preparing a great dinner, but rather their hearts to receive Jesus.

I have so much to learn from them.

Every day I allow myself to be moved by the witness of their lives. They are the lives of flesh and blood people, people who have nothing and share everything, who give me tears and smiles from dawn to dusk. People who touch my heart and transform me. I would not want a Christmas different from this one, because here I have met the family God dreamed for me. This Christmas I only want to be a refuge for hearts seeking peace, and God.

Navidad LMC Peru

The fact is that at times we forget that the true essence of Christmas and of life itself consists in recognizing daily that life is a gift and, what we do with it, should be a daily option of love.

This Christmas, forget neatly wrapped gifts and give of yourself, such as a time to live and share with those you love and to seek forgiveness with those who, during the year, have challenged you. From here I will walk from home to home to visit those who are alive and life giving in my days.

This Christmas may your table be plentiful, not with an infinite quantity of sweets, but with love, hope, affection and unity. This Christmas allow yourself to be the light in other people’s life and be an agent of reconciliation and peace. Allow yourself to belong to and mingle with all those you love, that together you may appreciate the gift of life. This Christmas, allow your humble heart to be the manger where Jesus will be born.

Christmas is wherever there is the courage to dream, the daring to keep alive those dreams with eyes closed. May the security of interior silence inspire you to live a discovery of God in you, in others and in the world.

This Christmas I will do what I do every day and will offer the best of me to Milagros and his children, to Marcellina, Celia, María, Valentina, Ariana and their brothers, Martin, Luís and many more to whom my heart leads me.
Navidad LMC PeruBest Wishes of a Holy and Happy Christmas

With love and gratitude,

CLM, Neuza Francisco