austraLasia #2984
A Missionary Reflects on Project Europe
LONDON: 7 January 2012 -- When I was receiving the missionary crucifix at the Basilica of Mary Help of Christian in Turin, last September, I was asking myself ‘What am I doing here?’ Looking at the departing missionaries from Korea, I was asking myself if there was a need for missionaries to go abroad, given the amount of work in our country yet to be done. I thought about myself and felt that God's call really is a mystery. In this way, I felt afresh that only through God’s providence could this life commitment be an answer to his call. Also, looking at the autumn trees losing their leaves according to natural law the ‘giving life’ looks very beautiful.
It seems that missionary life is another call received from God in religious life. My vocation started with the call to live and give my heart for poor people, to live in a place where I am needed. Obviously I need purify this motivation, listening more carefully to God's call than at the first moment of my vocation.
My missionary vocation started this way: I fel that the Korean SDB province would have no problem if I were not around. If I were not around, nobody would notice, since this province has already 'grown up'. This thought then grew - I wanted in my heart to live in some more needy place. This way my heart was inclined to the missionary vocation.
Of course, as missionary I still must purify and grow in my vocation, but this was the first movement of my heart. And with this heart I was praying that my life would be full of faith and zeal and become a sacrifice for the proclamation of the Gospel.
As part of ‘Project Europe’ I was sent to London, UK, and have been living there six months already. From our Rinaldi community at Battersea I was studying English at the language school. It was a short period, but it gave me an experience of what missionary life, with some of its difficulties, is. The GBR province has about 80 confreres. Some six communities are involved mainly in parish and school ministry. Nowadays their main challenge is the ageing of the confreres. Among the 80 Salesians only 25 are younger than 70 years of age. There are no new vocations and when we think about how the situation might be some ten years from now we might even sense a crisis - that our Congregation will disappear here in the near future. Due to the confreres ageing, there is a lack of Salesians involved in youth ministry and it is difficult to animate it in a Salesian way. The whole Church seems be declining.
Generally, the people believe they can do what they like, it is only a question of money and time; many live as if God did not exist. As a result material goods are plentiful but I sense their inner poverty. True happiness, deep joy is lost. This is the reason why many young confreres should be sent to Europe, not only to England. It seems that the ‘reverse mission’ era is needed.
Before leaving for the missions, I was listening to the many challenges of missionary life: food, climate, language, fraternal life, discrimination, were among the worries of many candidates. Now I know why they mentioned these. Without strong faith I would have already been overwhelmed by all these difficulties. In this situation I have begun to pray as never before; my life has begun to change under this ‘pressure’, to a real missionary life. If I do not meet God personally, one to one, face to face in prayer, I will not be able to endure, resist these challenges.
Here is the paradox: there is no better life path to holiness than a missionary life…
A Missionary Reflects on Project Europe
by Fr Mark Yang Yong Shik sdb
It seems that missionary life is another call received from God in religious life. My vocation started with the call to live and give my heart for poor people, to live in a place where I am needed. Obviously I need purify this motivation, listening more carefully to God's call than at the first moment of my vocation.
My missionary vocation started this way: I fel that the Korean SDB province would have no problem if I were not around. If I were not around, nobody would notice, since this province has already 'grown up'. This thought then grew - I wanted in my heart to live in some more needy place. This way my heart was inclined to the missionary vocation.
Of course, as missionary I still must purify and grow in my vocation, but this was the first movement of my heart. And with this heart I was praying that my life would be full of faith and zeal and become a sacrifice for the proclamation of the Gospel.
As part of ‘Project Europe’ I was sent to London, UK, and have been living there six months already. From our Rinaldi community at Battersea I was studying English at the language school. It was a short period, but it gave me an experience of what missionary life, with some of its difficulties, is. The GBR province has about 80 confreres. Some six communities are involved mainly in parish and school ministry. Nowadays their main challenge is the ageing of the confreres. Among the 80 Salesians only 25 are younger than 70 years of age. There are no new vocations and when we think about how the situation might be some ten years from now we might even sense a crisis - that our Congregation will disappear here in the near future. Due to the confreres ageing, there is a lack of Salesians involved in youth ministry and it is difficult to animate it in a Salesian way. The whole Church seems be declining.
Generally, the people believe they can do what they like, it is only a question of money and time; many live as if God did not exist. As a result material goods are plentiful but I sense their inner poverty. True happiness, deep joy is lost. This is the reason why many young confreres should be sent to Europe, not only to England. It seems that the ‘reverse mission’ era is needed.
Before leaving for the missions, I was listening to the many challenges of missionary life: food, climate, language, fraternal life, discrimination, were among the worries of many candidates. Now I know why they mentioned these. Without strong faith I would have already been overwhelmed by all these difficulties. In this situation I have begun to pray as never before; my life has begun to change under this ‘pressure’, to a real missionary life. If I do not meet God personally, one to one, face to face in prayer, I will not be able to endure, resist these challenges.
Here is the paradox: there is no better life path to holiness than a missionary life…
