HONG KONG: 25 November 2010 -- It is certainly not China
Province's fault that the item below is nearly a month old! No need to
explain the delay as readers know this already. However, noting
the hard copy of the English translation of Desramaut's book on Rua as
it arrived today from Bangalore (and they have done a creditable
printing job with it), and also having received a reminder from the HK
Development Office that they have not as yet seen their article in
print - here it is (word for word as provided)!
China Province has celebrated the centenary of the death of the first
successor of Don Bosco, Blessed Michael Rua.
The celebration was divided into two groups: The Salesian Youth and the
Salesian family .For the Salesian Youth Group, around one hundred
teenagers participated in the celebration.
Fr. Antonio Leung led the opening prayer and shared a short film with
the group which introduced blessed Michael Rua’s virtues and his
loyalty to Don Bosco. After the film, there were some interesting games
to let the teenagers think about the virtues and goodness of Don Rua
and Don Bosco. At the end of the meeting, they took a group photo and
attended the mass that followed.
For the Salesian family part, we invited Fr Simon Lam, Provincial of
China Province to share the vocation, life, virtues and goodness of Don
Rua. Fr. Provincial mentioned that the Salesian charism was passed on
from Don Bosco to Don Rua. Don Rua paid special attention to missionary
expeditions and sent Salesians all over the world. This was an
important step of passing Don Bosco’s charism to the world. He
emphasized that it was because of this transmission of the charism that
we were now able to celebrate in the Salesian Family.
In the second part of the session, we invited Fr. Jo Jo and Fr. Edgar
to share their missionary vocation. We understood that being a
missionary is very difficult due to cultural, social and environmental
differences that exist in the missions. They shared the reasons why
they still had chosen to be missionaries. This was because they did not
focus on difficulties but focused on the vocation from God. God’s grace
will not let you down. Even difficulties are the graces of God. This
reminded us to be more dependent on and faithful to God instead of our
own ability. This was an example of the true servant of God.
Another inspiring sharing was that evangelization could be active or
passive. Active evangelization was that we spread the good news through
our words and works. On the other hand, the work of Jesus could also be
revealed on those who tried their best to overcome physical handicap to
attend mass everyday even under cold weather. This was a case of
passive evangelization where no words or works of God had been
proclaimed but you were touched by God through witnessing the person’s
determination and perseverance.
After the session, all the participants were invited to join the
Memorial Mass of Blessed Michael Rua. _________________ AustraLasia is an
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