Savai'i ordination rounds off a run of five in
Australia-Pacific
SATAUA (Samoa): 16th December 2008 -- The ordination
yesterday of Fr Falaniko Felise, in the small village of Sataua on the
island of Savai'i, Samoa, has rounded off a run of five ordinations
this year in the Australia-Pacific province (AUL), which included one
epsicopal ordination and four priestly ordinations. Falani (as he
is more commonly known - Falaniko is the Samoan transliteration of
'Frank') was ordained by Archbishop Alapati Lui Mataeliga of the
Archdiocese of Apia, in the presence of the Salesian Provincial, Fr
Frank Moloney, many other Salesians and Salesian Sisters resident in
Samoa as well as diocesan clergy and Falani's extended family.
A point of interest for the occasion was that
Sataua, a small village on the North-western shores of the larger but
less populated island of Savai'i, is also the birthplace of the
ordaining archbishop.
Fr Falani made his novitiate at Lysterfield, in
Melbourne, and has worked at St Mary's Youth Centre and Don Bosco
Brunswick Youth Centre amongst other places in Australia. His
theological studies were completed in Suva, Fiji, where he was a
founding member of the Don Bosco House community at Nakasi, Suva Fiji.
With a total of three young Pacifican Salesians
ordained priests this year (Frs. Taisali and Aleki, the latter from
Tonga, are the other two) the contribution of the Pacific Islands and
particularly the two Samoas (Samoa and American Samoa) is significant
for the province; the request for Salesians and acceptance of that
request by Cardinal Pio Taufinu'u and the Rector Major Fr Viganò
respectively at the time is seen (certainly now) as clearly an
inspiration of the Holy Spirit that has ensured a constant flow of
young vocations of Pacifican cultures for the Salesian Congregation
and, for that matter, the Salesian Sisters.
The Salesians SDB currently have one community but
several presences in Samoa, which include a Technical College
recognised as the best of its kind in the nation, two very large
parishes, a formation house (prenovitiate) and service to the
archdiocese directly - Fr James Adayadiel, a Salesian missionary from
India, is Chancellor of the archdiocese. Consideration is now
being given to establishing a secondary school at Salelologa on the
island of Savai'i where there has not been a Salesian presence since
the beginnings nearly 27 years ago. _________________ AustraLasia is an
email
service
for the Salesian Family of Asia Pacific. It also functions
as an
agency for ANS based in
Rome.
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