austraLasia #2857 Japan: Salesian Vice Provincial visits earthquake
and tsunami zone
VATICAN RADIO: 19 May 2011 -- Some two months
following the earthquake/tsunami in Japan, the Salesian Vice
Provincial, Fr Mario Yamanouchi, has visited the places
where the disaster took place, including the city which has
become a symbol of nuclear peril, Fukushima. The first stage
of his visit, Saturday14 May, was to Fukushima, 220,000
inhabitants, just 60 km west of the atomic-powered centre
seriously damaged after the tsunami. Radioactivity in the
city is still high (1,6 sieverts) and the people, seeking to
limit the need to move around outside, always wear a
protective mask when they have to go outside.
On Sunday, 15 May, Fr Yamanouchi
went to Shiogama – 100 km from Fukushima – and celebrated
Mass there. Salesian Brother Francis Fukagawa had been sent
there by the Provincial, Fr Aldo Cipriani, with a view to
working with the Sendai diocese helping to coordinate and
support volunteers coming from all over Japan to help the
local population.
Later that evening Fr Yamanouchi joined
the visit by Cardinal Robert Sarah, President of the
Pontifical Council “Cor Unum”, sent by the Pope to Japan to
express the Pope's closeness and affection for the people.
At the conclusion of his visit Fr
Yamanouchi also went to Ishinomaki, which like other places
along the coast now looks like a ghost town filled with
ruined buildings and still affected by the odour of the
disaster. Around 100,000 soldiers are still working
tirelessly in the area, and in just two months one can note
the progress made. “Whoever sees places like this changes
the way of looking at things in life, of our very presence
in the cosmos” Fr Yamanouchi said at the end of it all. _________________ AustraLasia
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