Mongolia Delegation's Day 2020

By Fr. Andrew Nguyen Trung Tin, SDB.

Darkhan, Mongolia, Sunday 5 January 2020 -- On the Feast of Epiphany, the Salesian family in Mongolia gathered together in Ulaanbaatar for the Salesian family day. From Darkhan community, members travelled by taxi after the Sunday Mass for the Parish; after 5 hours travel on the bad road to Ulaanbaatar Community, we were welcomed by the confreres and group of Salesian Cooperators and Past Pupils; they are ready there preparing the event.

Time has come: we all gather around Fr. Paul Leung, Delegate of Mongolia, with a short prayer leaded by the ASC Darkhan, then our Delegate shared with us. Main focus was on the Strenna 2020: first we all watched the video of Strenna 2020 after that he shared with us about the Strenna with many challenges in our context of non-Christians, non-religious; beside us there were many past pupils, those have no faith in God as yet.

After a while for reflections then we went to dinner around the table with many Mongolian foods. It was prepare by Br. Andrew, the Past Pupils and ASC (Salesian Cooperators). After the prayer we cheered each other with a glass of red wine; we sang and wished for each other good news, good luck this year.

This year was the second time for the Past Pupils to have a chance to join in our celebration, with more members and as something special this year they are the one to organize this event for the whole family; there were also the ASC candidates who participated. So we can see and hope that the Salesian family tree now is growing bigger and wider. Ordinary in the cool and sandy land it is hard to grow but with “green” hands, patient mind and warm heart, we can plan still! The tree can't grow big and branches can't grow high if there are no deep roots in the soil of our Charism.

After the joint family meal we had many games and exchanged gift among the members of the family. At the end Fr. Paul also gave us a Christmas gift as a tradition of the family here. All of us took a picture of all members of the family and said goodbye before receiving a blessing from Father Delegate Paul.

Each year is different; each year sees more development and increasing members. This is a sign of Don Bosco and his charism being expressed! We thank God for Don Bosco, we thank God for the support and guidance. We hope this year will bring more blessings and fruits to our mission!

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