Sharing: 2017 The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

     Several volunteers and I organized Taize prayer for Christian Unity Prayer week at Holy Family Church on January 21, 2017.  We had supper together before the Taize prayer. 

     Fr. Lu led the opening prayer followed by short introduction about Christian Unity Prayer Week (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Week_of_Prayer_for_Christian_Unity) and Taize prayer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiz%C3%A9_Community) by Mr. Liu.

     Mrs. Sun prepared the power point presentation for the Taize prayer and Ms. Yun led the prayer.  Ms. Zhao read the Biblical passage for this year theme “Reconciliation: For the love of Christ compels us (2 Cor 5: 14 – 20) and the prayer of the faithful http://www.hkecumenical.org/index.php/prayer-of-faithful.html.  Ms. Xie sang several prayers of the faithful too.

    The Taize prayer ended around 7:45 p.m. followed by anticipated Sunday Mass at 8:00 p.m.  

Hong Kong, January 26, 2017

Sr. Anastasia B. Lindawati, M.M.

Let’s do simple things with simple love to make God’s love visible

Sharing: 2017 Trip to Chaonan

Mr. Zhou and Ms. Chen, two volunteers at Holy Family Church, invited me to attend their sacrament of matrimony in Xin Min – Chaonan on January 16, 2017.  Mrs. Hu and I went by bus not long after the daily Mass.  It took around 4-5 hours from Shenzhen.  It’s a high bus with reclining seat and toilet.  Mr. Zhou and his brother met us at the bus stop and then they rent a small car to go to their village.   

We had late lunch with gong fu tea at Mr. Zhou’s house besides having a conversation with his family.  His father accompanied us to walk to St. John’s Church at Xin Zhong village at around 5:00 p.m.  It’s one-floor building on the outside but there is second floor (around half of the building) on the inside for the mini Grotto, two bedrooms (one for guest priests or sisters and one for a layman) and one toilet.  Unfortunately, there is a public toilet in front of the Church.  Most of the villagers are not Catholics.  The old Church was built in 1882 and the latest renovation finished on 2014.  There are only one or two Masses during the year as the pastor should manage around 18 Churches.

The parishioners started to pray the evening prayer in Chaozhou language since 6:30 p.m. for more than an hour.  The pastor is not available that night so they invited Fr. Li came from another Church.  It’s a time for confession too.  The Church was full with their family and relatives and it’s only 1/3 of their clan as many of them are working outside the village and will go home during Chinese New Year.  The preferable Sacrament of Matrimony in this area is Mondays or Thursdays in Chaozhou language and they usually look for the good day based on the birthday of the bride and groom.  Their date of marriage was decided on the previous Sunday.

Mrs. Hu, Mrs. Ma, Mr. Zhou, his brother, his brother’s friend and I had late supper in a restaurant after the Mass.  Mrs. Hu and I stayed overnight at Mrs. Ma’s house.  Mrs. Ma told us that her mother usually goes to Holy Family Church so she showed us her mother’s picture and I recognize her, small world!  I invited Mrs. Ma to pray together as his husband would have surgery the next morning. The surgery went well.

Mrs. Ma dropped us at Mr. Zhou’s house to have breakfast and then left for Shenzhen first by motorcycle with passenger seats on the back and then by bus. They gave me a bag of sweet potatoes from their farm.

Hong Kong, January 18, 2017

Sr. Anastasia B. Lindawati, M.M.

Let’s do simple things with simple love to make God’s love visible

Sharing: Jan 2017 Volunteer Training at St. Anthony’s Church

Four youth of St. Anthony’s Church Shenzhen asked Fr. Lu about our youth ministry so Fr. Lu invited Mr. Wu and me to have a lunch meeting with them on January 8, 2017.  Fr. Lu introduced me as the person in charge for the youth ministry. 

Ms. Zhuo asked my suggestion about the youth training to be held at St. Anthony’s Church before Chinese New Year so I offered her to organize youth training on “How to be an effective volunteer?” on January 14 because we will organize youth gathering on “Christian Unity Prayer Week” at Holy Family Church on January 21.   Ms. Zhuo and her team agreed to my suggestion so we were communicating through WeChat apps.  They were proactively asking and providing what is needed for the training including preparing the link of the registration, snack and banner.  I returned to Hong Kong on January 10, 2017 and went back to Shenzhen on January 14, 2017 in time for the training. 

Fr. Lu led the praise and worship while the pastoral sister of St. Anthony’s Church Sr. Jiao played the piano, followed by ice breaking by Mr. Wu.  The pastor of St. Anthony’s Church gave a short talk on his hope to have youth ministry in their Church. 

I asked Mr. Wu to lead the first habit as he attended this training last June 2015 at Holy Family Church.  I led the rest of the training.  There were four habits with 15 minutes break in between two habits.

 Around 30 volunteers attended it.  Unfortunately we were a little bit late to start and we need to leave the classroom not later than 6.00 p.m. so we didn’t have the chance to have a group report for the two habits. 

I edited a little bit the power point of the program prepared by Fr. Bruno for a Putonghua workshop in Maryknoll Stanley House Hong Kong.   The training was based on “8 Habits of Highly Effective People.” There was an activity, Bible passage before mentioning each habit followed by small group discussion and group report.   My tutor helped me to add the details of the activities on the power point so that it will be easier to be understood than only listening to my instruction.  Both Mr. Wu and I asked all of them to read the Bible passage. 

It’s an opportunity to reach out to more people in mainland as my wish.

I attended the anticipated Mass at St. Anthony’s Church after having dinner with one of the parishioners, who let me stay in her studio apartment for free since October 2012.  

Here is the link of the pictures: https://www.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0EbuWrFm4ZM2gW&emid=shareprintviewer&linkid=link

Hong  Kong, January 17, 2017

Sr. Anastasia B. Lindawati, M.M.

Let’s do simple things with simple love to make God’s love visible

Sharing: 2016 Holy Family Feast Day

The Mass for the Holy Family Feast Day at Holy Family Church Shenzhen was celebrated on December 31, 2016 2:30 p.m. We invited other the priests, sisters and parishioners from other Churches to attend the Mass.  Fr. Zhang was the main celebrant, who just arrived from Beijing that morning and would leave the same day.  There were 9 other priests and 12 sisters including me.  The leader of CCPA Shenzhen is among the guests during the mass and dinner at the nearby restaurant. 

Fr. Lu cancelled the renewal of marriage vows ceremony around one hour before the Mass as there was only one couple and he knew that they would be shy to do it alone.

The Sunday School students performed after the Mass.  There were more than 500 people attending the Mass.

Several parishioners and I attended the Mother of God Feast Day at Mother of God Church, Yantian-Shenzhen after our Sunday Morning Mass.  There were 4 priests, 4 sisters and around 300 people attending the Mass.  Several sisters and I visited Hui Ling Shenzhen, just walking distance from the Church.  There was a reception after the Mass at the restaurant nearby. 

Hong Kong, 3 January 2016

         

Sr. Anastasia B. Lindawati, M.M.

Let’s do simple things with simple love to make God’s love visible