The Devotion to Our Lady of Safekeeping: From Genoa and Tortona to Bonoua

According to a tradition, on August 29 of the year 1490, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to a peasant called Benedetto Pareto, in the Monte Figogna, in Genoa and asked him to build a chapel on the mountain. Pareto was surprised and replied that he was only a poor man and would not be able to do that. However, the Virgin Mary exhorted him by saying, “Do not be afraid!”

Nevertheless, Pareto went home and did not speak with anyone about the apparition. A few days later he felt from a tree and was seriously injured. The Virgin Mary appeared to him again and he was miraculously healed. The event convinced him to speak about the apparition and seek help to build the chapel.

Orione Community Training Centre (OCTC): From Kaburugi to Kandisi

I.        Disabilities in Kenya:

 ·      Disability in Kenya is often seen as burdensome and shameful. Many of the tribal beliefs consider it something strange related to witchcraft, a curse from ancestors o a divine punishment.  

I.I. The numbers

 According to the World Health Organization WHO, persons with disabilities in developing countries such as Kenya, account for 15% of the total population of the country. In that 15% of the population, a full 75% have developmental disabilities.

Of these 3.6 million Kenyans with developmental disabilities, half of 1% have access to health care and rehabilitation services.

Only 23,000 students (between the ages of 10 to 30) have access to education, en the 1,200 schools and special facilities for persons with developmental disabilities in the country. The 48 small residential homes and private schools provide care for only 438 persons.

New Chapel: Things are moving forward

While many of our superiors and benefactors are question every day: Where are we now with the proceedings of the new chapel of Nairobi?

The news are good, let us give thanks to God. With the prayers and support of each and every one, the work is progressing, and very well, even if it does not seen like with a cruising speed.

As a reminder, the month of July our prayers and intercessions were about the launch of the phase of the frame and roofing. Well this is almost a step that will soon be referred to the past.

A beautiful and painstaking work continues at this level, evidenced by the pictures.

We are grateful especially to all the benefactors, friends, superiors and confreres for all the sacrifices and prayers.

Ave Maria and forward with our Holy Founder Don Orione and Saint Joseph, the cashier of the Divine Providence.

RECOLLECTION : "Who Do You Say That I Am?"Mark 8:27-30

There comes a time in the life of every Christian when you have to come to grips with the person of Jesus Christ and your relationship to him. You can weigh the witness of scripture and take into account all the commentaries on the life of Christ; you can consider the views others, past and present, but you can’t escape this one central question: Who do you say that I am? 

 

This morning as we listen once more to this familiar passage from Mark’s gospel, I invite you to put yourself in the story and ask, “What is my relationship to Jesus Christ?” 

 

The text begins with a question we can all relate to: Who do the people say that I am?  How do others see me?  By what name and traits and deeds am I known?  The question strikes at the heart of our quest for identity: If others were asked to describe you today, what would they say?

 

The most common way for others to know us is by name. That’s usually the first step in getting acquainted. It’s important, not only for others to know what to call you, but because your name is more than a label, it reflects who you are – your family heritage and your self-identity. 

“Birds of a feather flock together”

“Who do you say I am?”

Since yesterday Friday 16th August night, our Community, seminarians and formatters have tried to answer this question of Jesus in Mk 8:27. In this passage, Jesus asks about our perceptions of Him, and then challenges our ideas about "the Christ". What is our perceptions of Jesus changed throughout our spiritual journey?

The academic year having officially been opened, we have since last Friday night with the night prayer, opened our recollection day of new academic year.

It was preached by the Father Director of the Community, Father Paul MBOCHE.

Mary, the way to Jesus

To Jesus, to the Holy Father and to souls through Our Lady:

Our Lady calls our Congregation to be a Marian Congregation,

Which lives with a love for God, for the Church and for the poor,

But through and completely with a love for Our Lady.

As we celebrate today the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we find it appropriate to share with you a thought of our Founder St. Luigi Orione on Mary.

Mary, the way to Jesus

To speak about Don Orione’s love for Our Lady means speaking about his person, so much did he fill his whole life with Mary. These words of his show this: ‘Read on my forehead, read in my heart, read in my soul, and you will see nothing that does not bear the writing:  Thanks to Mary’.

This close link with Mary is explained by the strong experience that Don Orione had had of Christ; for whom, following the example of St. Paul, he could also say: ‘For me, to live is Christ’ (Gal. 2:20). Our Father has offered us the love for Our Lady as the way and the road that leads us to Jesus, because she is the perfect model of the love of Jesus.

But to reach the point of living Jesus, Don Orione was as much convinced of the necessity of imitating Mary, since she is the Mother and the disciple who permits us to reach her Son.

Mary is in a position to help every Christian and every man to get nearer to her Son, because she welcomed Him into her life, because she was the first to show Him to humanity, represented by the Magi and the Shepherds (cf. Mt 2:1-12; Luke 2:1-20, and then because she was always near her Son in the most important moments of His life.

How to Study Don Orione: Different Kinds of Knowledge of St. Luigi Orione

(Extract from PELOSO, Flavio, 

“Hemeneutica orionina per conoscere Don Orione da figli” 

in Mesaggi di Don Orione.)

We will deepen three different kinds of knowledge of St. Luigi Orione: spiritual, historical and pedagogic ones. All of them are necessary and complementary to understand him.

Spiritual Knowledge of St. Luigi Orione

We may knowledge Don Orione as his sons, as people who have his “same spirit”. We will read his writings and his life, study the charism and the Constitutions, but we will try to get into his inner life. To know Don Orione it is not enough to read his life, writings or articles about him, we need to get into his heart really to understand him[1].

A charism, first of all, is a gift or the Holy Spirit. It is not a specific apostolate, or religious ideology or a way of praying. A charism has apostolate, a way of praying and working, etc, but it is more than all these things together. A charism is a “soul”, a gift of the Holy Spirit which gives form and configures everything: prayer, apostolate, community life, etc.

Fr. Luigi Orione was a saint, a person full of God; as saint, his life was unified in God. John Paul II said: “It is impossible to summarize in a few sentences the adventurous and sometimes dramatic life of one who called himself, humbly, but shrewdly: "God's porter". But we can state that he was doubtlessly one of the most outstanding personalities of this century, because of his openly professed Christian faith”[2].

Karibu kwa Nyumba: finished the holidays

After nearly three months of vacation, our young men in formation have joined the Community of Nairobi.They were gone, the month of June after the closing of the academic year 2012-2013 which, thanks to God and the work of everyone of them and the team trainer was successfully completed and saw the departure of their elders the postulants for the year of novitiate in the Philippines.For the new 2013-2014 academic year ahead, we have nine young in philosophy. They are divided as follows:

• §      1st year of Philosophy: four

• §      2nd year of Philosophy: two

• §      3rd year of Philosophy: three.

AUGUST MESSAGE

I think we have all heard the clear message of Pope Francis to the young people at Rio and the entire world: “Go, don’t be afraid, and serve”. It is a message to all young people but even more so to us religious and priests.  It seems to echo very much what Don Orione is telling us.  In this month of August dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary let us ask Our Lady to help us to understand how to put this message into practice in our Orionine religious life with wisdom.   May God bless you all!

Fr Malcolm.

Delegation News "June-July 2013"

Meetings in the Philippines

Before leaving the Philippines, I took part in two meetings at the beginning of June.  One was with all the confreres of perpetual vows from the three communities at Payatas, to discuss the general situation of our Congregation in the Philippines.  The second was with the formators, Fr Anderson and Fr John Castillo and Fr Eucinei at Montalban, to try to establish the right priorities in this community pre-eminently dedicated to the formation of future members of the Congregation in the Philippines.

The Philippines a nation of young people

Reflecting on the Philippines, it is obvious that there is a very large number of young people there.  Also our Confreres are mostly young and working hard to serve God and the people in their many needs.  The work of formation of future confreres is a very important part of that work.  Let us pray for them in this challenging but most rewarding work.