More foreign aid needed to build peace

I have been granted a chance to meet someone whom I wanted to meet for so many years.  Finally I managed to meet her in her office in Tokyo on Tuesday.  She is the president of JICA, Japan International Cooperation Agency, Ms. Sadako OGATA. 

In April 1995, I was in Bukavu, Zaire as a coordinator for Caritas Japan team working in one of more than 30 Rwandan refugee camps in the area.  It was exactly one year after the beginning of genocide in Rwanda.  On 11 April at 10 pm, our camp, situated in a village called Birava, was attacked by several armed soldiers coming from the lake Kivu which was the border between Zaire and Rwanda.  They managed to cross the lake by 3 boats, according to several eye witnesses. The Birava camp was facing against to Rwanda where refugees, Futu people, came from.  Officially, no one knows who were these soldiers who attacked the camp that night.  Rumor among refugees said they were RPF from present Rwanda.  No one knows.  What I remember is 2 hours of exchange of fire and sounds of bomb blasts.  What I remember is more than 30 dead and more than 150 injured people.  I was shaken.  I can not forget the experience of that night.  Still as at now, whenever I pass by the construction site and hear the sound of jackhammer, I immediately recall that night.  At that time, we could not rely on the Mobutu's army since they were not paid enough or at all.  So we wrote a letter of appeal among Caritas members in the area to Ms. Ogata who was the High Commissioner of Refugees of UN at that time.  The local representative of UNHCR in Bukavu was Mr. Patrick D'souza who used to work for Caritas before.  He immediately took action and negotiated with the UN to hire Zaire soldiers as their own security force to protect camps.  So I wanted to thank Ms. Ogata for quick response at that time.

Now working for Japanese government as the president of the Government foreign aid agency, she shared a lot on foreign aid policy of Japan and peace building.  This meeting was organised by the publisher, Don Bosco and will appear as their article on the September issue of "Katolikku Seikatsu", a Japanese Catholic monthly magazine.  Ms. Ogata is a practising Catholic.  She emphasised that Japanese people have to realise that Japan can not survive by itself alone but only in cooperation with other countries.  To secure world peace, development aid to poorer countries is a must for Japan.

GA of CBCJ concluded

A week long general assembly of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Japan (CBCJ) for the year 2010 has just been completed on Friday afternoon in Japan Catholic Center in Tokyo.  All together, 16 bishops and one administrator joined the assembly together with representatives from both male and female major superiors in Japan.  Presently there are 16 dioceses in Japan and auxiliary bishops have been assigned to Tokyo and Osaka, one for each, so that there should be 18 bishops to join the assembly.  However there are 2 sees vacant at this moment in Japan, Oita and Sapporo, and, therefore, one administrator joined the assembly from Oita.  (I am the administrator of Sapporo)

Almost 90 % of the agenda had been proposed by the Liturgy Commission, especially on the translation of Mass text for which the Liturgy Commission has been working for quite sometime.  We had to go through Latin text, present Japanese text and newly proposed translation text at the same time for entire Mass.  In fact, it takes time and we have not finished yet.  When we completed the discussion on the proposed text for this year's agenda, a secretary for the commission told us that he had 5 times more texts ready for us to discuss during next assembly.  We just heard that the English translation has just completed and got the approval from the Holy See recently but I have no idea how many more years it may take to complete the Japanese translation.

On Wednesday evening, after the afternoon presentation given by Caritas Japan on foreign aid policy of the Catholic aid agency, we went to visit the Nunciature in Tokyo.  Photo above is the chapel of the Nunciature which was renovated recently and the Nuncio is explaining us about the newly installed bronze door of the chapel.  After this, Nuncio presented a congratulatory message of Holy Father to Bishop Misue of Hiroshima who has been celebrating his 25th anniversary as bishop this year.  Then the meeting was completed with wonderful Italian dinner.

Well I finally managed to come back to my house in Niigata.  I left Niigata last Friday to Sapporo where I had to give a talk on Saturday in Maruyama parish.  Then after the talk, I flew from Sapporo to Akita to join the Akita district for Laity Rally on Sunday.  Fr. Xavier Susai, SVD, a rector of the SVD seminary in Nagoya gave a talk on the Christian vocation and I said Mass in the afternoon.  Indian born rector of the seminary attracted the laity of Akita district with his wonderful Japanese and several jokes.  From there I flew to Tokyo on Monday to join the GA of CBCJ.  Well, I have to fly again this evening to Sapporo while Japanese National Team is playing in South Africa against to Holland.  There will be confirmation Mass in Sapporo tomorrow.
 

Priests' rally in Akita

From 7 June to 9, Niigata diocesan priests' rally was held in Akita which was attended by 29 priests working in the diocese, including both diocesan and religious priests.  At this moment, all together 38 priests are working in the diocese including 2 elder Fathers who have been on their retirement.  Out of this 38, 17 are diocesan priests of Niigata, 2 are of Takamatsu, one from Tokyo diocese, 3 belongs to the Picpus Fathers, 5 belongs to the Franciscans and 10 are SVDs.  This year, the diocese received 2 new priests from SVD, Fr.Hayon, a newly ordained, from Indonesia to Akita and Fr. Odilon from Korea to Tsuchizaki.  We gathered together at Foresta Chokai Hotel in southern Akita.  Hotel is located at the foot of Mount Chokai and surrounded by deep forest.

As we are approaching to the end of the Year of Priests, we chose the theme which is closely related to the daily pastoral realities of priests.  Since Japanese bishops have been talking about the Human Life which is a gift of God, we decided to learn more about the life threatening issue in the area, the suicide issue.  Since 1998, immediately after the current economic recession has started in Japan, more than 30,000 people began to commit suicide every year up till now in all over Japan.  Number is increasing each year and Akita is well known in Japan as the area to record the highest rate of suicide almost every year.  People commit suicide because of financial difficulties, family problem, personal relationship and many other causes but most of the cases have been connected to the depression.  We invited professor Sasaki Hisanaga of Akita University who has been involving himself with the prevention effort of the local government.  Professor Sasaki is a Catholic.  We also invited Bishop Koda Kazuo of Tokyo who has been working on the topic as a bishop in charge of Caritas Japan.  Church has to learn more about the issue to be ready to respond to the need of people who are in danger of committing suicide and also to learn more about how to console the grief of families and relatives of those who committed the suicide.

Laity rally in Nagaoka

On this day of Holy Trinity Sunday, Nagaoka district's Laity Council organised annual rally in Omotemachi Parish in Nagaoka.  Nagaoka district consists of parishes in Itoigawa, Naoetsu, Takada, Myoko, Kashiwazaki, Tokamachi, Omotemachi and Fukuzumi and the district has been entrusted to Franciscans.  As for this years rally, the administratibe board of the Laity Council of the district chose "learn more about our Liturgy" as their theme and invited Fr. Shirahama, the liturgy professor of the Japan Catholic Seminary, for a talk.   For the 34th gathering of the laity in the district, Fr. Shirahama gave almost 2 hours intensive talk on the spirit of Liturgy which is thanksgiving to almost 200 people including all the pastors of the district.  Whenever we think about a study session on Liturgy, its all about regulations.  But Fr. Shirahama's talk was enlightening to understand what is behind all these liturgy in our Church. 

After lunch together, there was a photo session and a procession for Holy Mother, the Flores de Mayo.  Filipino community is quite large in the district and majority of kids are of theirs.  The gathering was really international.  After the procession from the kindergarten where we had talks and lunch to the Parish, we started Mass at 2 pm.  Readings and songs were prepared both in Japanese and English.  To create a community which overcomes both age and nationality barrier or cultural difference is one of the priorities of this diocese and I should say that the Nagaoka district is trying very hard to create communities of many cultures.  I hope they will continue their effort to build communities with one heart with many faces.

Pentecost in Tokamachi

Yesterday was the Pentecost Sunday and it was quite a windy day in Niigata. Well, it would be good to feel the blowing wind on the Pentecost Sunday so that we may be able to imagine how the Holy Spirit blew on the day among disciples. I went to Tokamachi to celebrate the Pentecost Sunday Mass with the community of the Assumption Parish. During the Mass, 3 people received the sacrament of confirmation and 2 kids received their first communion. Since the parish priest of Nagaoka, Fr. Bruno, ofm, visits Tokamachi after he completes Mass in Nagaoka, Sunday Mass in Tokamachi begins at 3 pm. As for yesterday, people started to gather together around 2 pm for the Flores de Mayo procession. Yes, majority of the community in Tokamachi Catholic Church is from Philippines who are married to local Japanese. So yesterday before Mass, several original Japanese Catholics, Filipino mothers, number of their Japanese husbands and their kids made a procession after the statue of Mary. What a international community. All together around 40 people went around inside the Kindergarten since the windy and rainy weather did not permit us to go out.

After the Mass, we went to the Kindergartens hall for a party. There were a dance by a boy who had received his first communion, games and good food. Fr. Bruno suggested mothers to let little ladies wear Yukata dress instead of the traditional white costume for first communion, etc. What impressed me the most was 2 Filipino mothers who wore Japanese traditional Kimono and gave a Japanese dance performance. They have been in Japan for many years and managed to immerse themselves deep into Japanese culture.

I am sure that there must be a lot of problem they face in building a united community for the Tokamachi Church with different nationalities and back grounds. Especially, at this moment, Japanese Catholics are minority in Tokamachi. I would like to ask each one of the community to be compassionate to each other and also try to understand differences of each culture.

Confirmation in Takada

Ascension day is celebrated on the seventh Sunday of Easter in Japan and, therefore, yesterday was the celebration. On that Sunday, 13 people received the sacrament of Confirmation in the Christ the King Parish in Takada. The parish priest, Fr. Mario Canducci, a Franciscan from Italy, always does his best to prepare candidates very well to receive the sacraments every year. Though he is over 75 and preparing for his golden jubilee of ordination this year, he is still energetic in his pastoral activities. I was happy to see several young faces among the 13 candidates yesterday. It will be quite difficult for young kids to continue to come to church after they enter high schools because of extra curriculum activities on Sundays. So Fr. Mario does his best to catch kids just before they are really involved in these activities to prepare for the confirmation. Though they will have difficulties to attend Sunday Masses, the memory of confirmation will remain in their heart, and one day, they may return to the community.

The Confirmation Mass was celebrated by myself, Fr. Mario, Fr. Takayabu, a resident priest and Fr. Ohtaki, the chancellor of the diocese. Fr. Ohtaki was originally baptized in Takada while he was a high school student and was visiting the area for the diocesan business. I hope more young people will follow good example of their senior brother of Takada, Fr. Ohtaki, and join the priesthood in near future. In this regard, I was happy to be with a young boy who performed his duty quite perfectly as a lone altar boy during the ceremony vested in his over sized cassock.

Congratulations for those 13 members who received the sacrament. I am also happy to see among them faces from several countries. God bless you all with his Holy Spirit.

Returned from Taiwan

FABC BILA meeting has been finished on Thursday evening with a closing Mass in near by parish in Taoyuan. Mass was attended by both participants of the meeting and local Catholics of the parish who organised a welcome party for us after the Mass. As the time-table of our meeting was so tight, I could not go out from the building where we stayed since our arrival on Monday. So it was good for us to have a chance to be away from the meeting site and be with local people. Also it was good occasion to know the talent of our participants to entertain others. Especially we are all amazed and enjoyed dancing performance of Korean group led by a Sister who is a wonderful dancer.

During the meeting, besides a talk by Bishop Tagle, Sr. Choi Hae Young, RSCJ, a provincial superior of RSCJ sisters in Korea, gave a talk on the title, "Mary, Model of discipleship in the Church." Also the drafting committee worked so hard that we could manage to complete the meeting with a wonderful final statement. The main objectives of the meeting was: to encourage the Church to look Mary as a woman who lived through many of the trying situations that women experience today, and to encourage women to draw courage and inspiration from her, and to provide for the continuing process of awareness of women's role and hence provide a guide to do this program in the home diocese of the participants. In many countries in East Asia, though the majority of the Church community are women, still decisions are made by men.How to encourage women to be involved in the decision making process in Church community would be one of the crucial point we have to seriously look into, including in my diocese.

On Friday, finally released from sitting in a meeting room, we went out to Taipei city for a day tour. Photo above is taken at our first stop, the Museum of World Religions which is run by Buddhist monks. The museum provides information on several major religions in the world and also invite visitors to find the meaning of meditation. A Buddhist nun gave us an introduction talk and invited us to join the vegetarian lunch in the museum cafeteria. In fact, we were surprised to see so many varieties of vegetarian dishes. It seems the cafeteria is also popular among local people. Also we visited the Taiwan National Women's Center after the museum.

Thanks for those who organised the meeting and thanks for our host in Taiwan.