Religious Forum Felicitates Missionaries

VIJAYAWADA, Andhra Pradesh, Nov. 19, 2010, 12:30 Hrs:(CBCI News/ Sr. Benigna Menezes)

Keeping the World Mission Day on November 17, the diocesan religious association felicitated the missionaries involved in evanglelization programme in Vijayawada.

Over a dozen missionaries both men and women religious who worked all their life for the preaching and proclamation of the Word of God and for faith formation of the Parish communities were honoured in the celebration organised by the Catholic Religious of India (CRI)

Jesuit, Fr. Stanley, the President of the LCRI said, “In this young local Church of Vijayawada where the New Evangelization work is carried out with vigour, we wanted to unite ourselves in prayer at the table of the Lord to ask God’s blessings upon the various programmes of the new evangelization work in the diocese. Vincentian missionary to Andhra Pradesh Fr. Augustine,Thuluvath, animated the gathering of nearly a hundred religious.

The frontline missionaries who had laboured as preachers, catechists building faith among the people were honoured by the local CRI body with a shawl and a flower bouquet.

Nirmala Sister Roberta who had been the assistant director of EUNTES, in Philippins, which is a centre for forming the Asian missionaries, said that the missionaries need encouragement to carry on the difficult task of direct proclamation of the Word of God though she had always experienced God’s protection and closeness in her missionary endeavour.