Dhruwadeepti: Religion //
Journey Of a Missionary Prriest //
Jesu Christi Jayanti- 2000
Fr. George Pallivathukal.
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| Fr. George Pallivathukal. |
Bishop Theophane was a heart patient. He had an open heart surgery in Holland in 1981. he was given ten years of life by his doctors after his disciplined life gave him a much longer life and proved his doctors wrong. He pastured the diocese for 25 years. However he had a heart attack in Schahdol where he was on a visit in 1997. Bishop Theophane sent his resignation to the Internuncio. The Internuncio istead of accepting his resignation suggested that he could have an auxiliary Bishop to help him with the administration of the diocese. The lot fell on Rev. Gerald Almeida . He was consecrated with right of succession by Bishop Theophane on the 17th September 1997.
I was happy and excited about the elevation of Gerald Almeida as Bishop. I knew him well, we had worked together staying under the same roof. He had worked only in the rural areas of our diocese amoung the poor tribals. And much of the social work when he was the Director of social work was done in villages to uplift the poor tribals ecconomically. I was happy because I thought that the new Bishop who has lived amoung the poor villagers, who has shared their sorrows and joys, who knows their needs will now exercise his office for the uplift of the poor people of our diocese.
Bishop Gerald, de facto administrator
One day Bishop Theophane called all his priests for a meeting and in front of them he announced that he was handling over the administration of the diocese into the hands of Bishop Gerald would be his decisions binding on everybody and he would not function as an appallate court to discus the decisions of the Co-adjutor Bishop.
Transfer from Ranji to Binjhia
Because of the illness of Bishop Theophane the usual annual transfers in the diocese had not taken place in the summer of 1997. After taking over the administration of the diocese Bishop Gerald prepared the transfer list in consultation with the college of consultors and submitted it to the senior Bishop for his approval and signature.
A transfer was due for me . I was transfered to Binjhia as priest in charge as well as Director of the Diocesan Pastoral Centre. I took over the Binjhia parish and the Diocesan Pastoral Centre from Fr. George Thomas in November 1997. He was the Director of the centre only for one year. He was a very capable and active priest. He realized that he had no training which could make him competent to head a pastoral centre effectively. He was honest enough to accept that ordination to priesthood alone does not make a person fit to be the Director of a pastoral centre. He needs some special training in any one of the disciplines, catechetics, liturgy or Bible to function effectively as the head of a pastoral institute. So he told the Bishop about his inability to continue as the Director of the Centre. So I was asked to go back to the pastoral centre.
When Fr. George Thomas handed over the charges of the Diocesan Pastoral Centre and the parish to me there was no money to hand over. Fr. George T.was living there from hand to mouth. There was no income in the parish. Parish was very small and the parishioners ' income was meager and therefore they were not able to pay much to the church. The parish was getting the food expenses of the priest and the salary of the cook and the catechist from Diocesan head- quarters. There were many other expenses in the parish besides these.
A good Samaritan
One day I was in my office, thinking how to face this situation. At that time Fr. Santosh Thomas , the Director of Diocesan Social Centre called me and said that he could help me with a small Caritas India Project of one Lakh.The project could be completed as an activity of the Pastoral Centre. He said that I could save some money by using the pastoral centre premises and vehicle for the project and by personally conducting the programmes. Fr. Santhosh asked one of his staff members to help me to prepare an application for the project. Application was prepared in a day and the next day I received the money. It brought a great relief to me. I was deeply grateful to Fr. Santosh for this timely help to tide over the situation. My predecessor in Binjhia also had to depend on the Diocesan Social Welfare Centre for finacial support.
Jesu Christ Jayanti 2000
The late Holy Father Pope John Paul 11 announced the year 2000 as the year of the great Jubilee. In India we called it Yesu Christ Jayanthi 2000. The Pope , through an apostolic letter "Tertio Millennio Adveniente "dated November 10. 1994 dedicated this Jubilee to the Blessed Trinity. He gave guidelines for an adequatepreparation for the celebration. The Holy Father wanted to use the occation for a spiritual and catechetical renewal in the Church. He suggested remote and immediate preparation of the faithful for this celebration. The Holy father wrote that "It cannot be denied that, for many christians the spiritual life is passing through a time of uncertainty which affects not only their moral life, but also their life of prayer and the theological correctness of their faith"( TMA-36) So the Holy father dedicated the year 1997 specially to Jesus Christ., the world become Man, and 1978 to the Holy Spirit " By the power of whom Incarnation was accomplished " and who is the sanctifying presence with the community of Christ's disciples , and year 1999 to God the Father. "The whole of Christian life is like a grat pilgrimage to the house of the Father whose unconditional love for every human creature and in particular for the 'Prodigal son' (ef. LK.15. 11. 32), we discover a new each day"(TMA 48). This preparation and the celebration of the great Jubilee was also in preparation for welcoming the third millennium of the christan era.
Responding to the call of the Holy Father the Indian Church immediately got into action. The Bishops of India appointed Fr. Paul Puthenangady s.d.b. as the National Secretary for YKJ (Yesu Krist Jayanti) 2000. In Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarth Bishop Theophane was appointed Chairman of the YKJ 2000 committee. On my recommendation Bishop appointed Mr. B.K. John .a member of my former Parish, Ranjhi,as the Regional Secretary. I assisted him as the joint secretary and the treasurer of the Regional Committee.
Mr. B.K.John was an officer in the Ordnance Factory of Khamaria, Jabalpur. He was very much committed to the parish. He was agood organizer and intelligent. His suggestions for the parish were constructive and practical. He was very generous in giving to the Church. He was respected in the parish and in the diocese. He was the right choice to be the Secretary of the regional Committee for YKJ 2000-celebration. His leadership was appreciated and acclaimed at the Regional and National level. From the time I was the parish priest of Ranjhi until today John is the animator of Sunday faith formation of the parish and I would say because of him and a few more committed lay persons like Mr. Reggle David and the MontfortBrothers of Ranjhi the Sunday Catechesis in the parish is going on very well.
Resource materials for YKJ 2000-preparation.
Basing ourselves on the apostolic letter of the Holy Father Mr. B.K. John and myself prepared the guidelines for the three years preparation for the great Jubilee and distributed it to all the dioceses of Madhy Pradesh and Chhattisgarth region and to all the parishes of Jabalpur diocese. In the diocese we trained parish teams and parish council members to carry on the programmes in their respective places. Through the able and dedicated leadership of Bishop Theophane and the ability of Mr.B.K. John the Madhya Pradesh -Chhattisgarth region was in the forefront of renewal in North and Central India according to the observation made by Fr. Paul Puthenangady. Fr. Paul travelled far and wide all over the country animating and supervising the Yesu Krist Jayanti 2000 preparation programme.
Catechism Books
The Madhy Pradesh Bishops asked me to prepare catechism books for the years 1997, 1998, and 1999. I received this mandate from the Bishops late and so I could not prepare a book on Jesus Christ for an intensive catechesis on the redeemer in the year 1997, but I immediately started working on a catechism on the Holy Spirit and another one on God the Father. The Theological and Historical Commission for the great Jubilee year 2000 had prepared official catechetical texts in praparation for the Holy Year 2000. The content of the books provided the subject matter but was beyond the comprehension of our ordinary people. So I made a study of these books, simplified them and published them for the use of our schools and parishes in the states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarth. Satpracher press, Indore,printed the books both in English and Hindiand reached them to all the eleven dioceses of the Region. My book on the Holy Spirit is used even today by many dioceses when they prepare the youth for confirmation.
Regional celebration of YKJ 2000 at Bhopal
Before the concluding National Celebration in Dharmaram, Bangalore, we in MP had a two-day Regional Celebration of the YKJ 2000 at Bhopal. Bishop Theophane worked very hard to make this celebration a success. I had presented a paper on "The future of the Church in Central India" during the celebration.I said that the Church of the 21st century in our region will be the Church of the Laity. Therefore we need to prepare our laity to take their proper place in the Church. Without animating and training the Laity we will have a dead Church in Madhya Pradesh. //-
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ഈ ബ്ളോഗില് പ്രസിദ്ധീകരിക്കുന്ന അഭിപ്രായങ്ങളുടെ ഉത്തരവാദിത്തം അതെഴുതുന്ന വ്യക്തികള്ക്കു മാത്രമായിരിക്കും. സഭ്യമല്ലാത്ത ഭാഷയും അപകീര്ത്തിപ്പെടുത്തുന്ന പദപ്രയോഗങ്ങളും ഒഴിവാക്കുക-
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