The 3rd meeting of diocesan teams supporting Sendai diocese

The third meeting of diocesan teams to support Sendai diocese has been held in Fukishima area from 19 June, Wednesday till 21 June, Friday. More than 60 participants, including three bishops, one bishop elect, priests, religious and laity from all over Japan's 16 dioceses had bee

n divided into three groups and dispatched to three different courses for site visits. I joined a group to visit Iwaki and the area near to Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant which had been damaged by Tsunami in 2011.

On Wednesday morning, we made a visit to Iwaki parish and met with a volunteer team of the parish who shared their experiences with evacuees from town close to the nuclear power plant. Also we made a visit to the Mominoki volunteer station run by Saitama diocese. In the afternoon, we were taken by bus to the area quite closed to the nuclear power plant. It is possible to enter the area but residents are not allowed to live there since entry during night time is prohibited. We could see piles of debris of decontamination of the area in black plastic back. It may be quite impossible to find any place to keep these backs for long time without fear of the residents.

Even after two years of the disaster, earthquake and tsunami, because of radiation, people are not able to clear debris of the disaster.  We were in front of Tomioka rail way station, which has not been in function because of tsunami, and saw several damaged buildings left behind as they were on 11 March, 2011.

 

On Thursday, the 3rd meeting of diocesan teams supporting Sendai diocese was held in Koriyama parish chapel in Fukushima.  During the meeting, Mr.Sugawara of Ofunato parish in Iwate shared his experience of establishing a "Sister Relationship" with Sakai parish in Osaka. Mr. Sato of Sakai parish also shared his view from the other side of this relationship.

They did not know each other until the day of earthquake and tsunami hit Tohoku area on March 11, 2011. Ofunato and Sakai is 1,000 Km apart. Sakai parishioners led by Fr.Murata of Osaka diocese offered help to Ofunato people and also proposed to establish special relationship between two parishes. Since then parishioners from Sakai visited Ofunato several times and, for this spring, number of parishioners from Ofunato visited Sakai for first time to pray and play together.

This is the act of charity, Caritas, of Catholic Church. We do offer professional relief service from Caritas agencies to disaster victims. And it may be a short term services for the disaster hit area. But our commitment does not stop there. We, as parts of one body of Jesus, also offer long lasting partnership to walk along with people in the disaster hit area. Through these activities, not only professional relief workers, everyone in Catholic Church could join Caritas activities of Church.

 

 

 

Archbishop Dominic Andoh of Accra has passed away

Archbishop Dominic Andoh, emeritus archbishop of Accra in Ghana, has passed away on 17 May at age of 84. He was a bishop of Accra, the capital city of Ghana since 1971 till 1992 when the diocese was raised as Archdiocese and became an archbishop till his retirement in 2005. 

And he was my "boss" from 1986 to 1992. I was sent to Ghana in 1986 and appointed to a mission in upper Krobo land.  Then in June 1987, I was appointed as a priest in charge of Osonson by Archbishop Andoh.  In 1992, the Accra diocese was divided to two and Koforidua diocese was created. My parish, Our Lady of Lourdes in Osonson was included in the Koforidua diocese and Bishop Palmer Buckle, present Archbishop of Accra became my superior in Koforidua diocese at that time.

I have a lot of good memories with Archbishop Andoh. He used to visited parishes every three years and stayed with us for a week. So I took him around to visit my 23 outsations for confirmation. When I met him in 2006 and 2010 in his retirement house in Accra, he also mentioned several wild experiences with me in bush with a lot of laugh and smile.   He especially enjoyed an old mission house in Osonson and also a wild car ride through bush in upper Krobo area.

May he rest in perfect peace.

Funeral will be held on 6 June in Accra. R.I.P.

Audience with Holy Father in Rome

I was in Rome from 13 to 17 to attend the Representative Council (Repco) of Caritas Internationalis which is a kind of board meeting of Caritas Confederation.  Asia is represented by Caritas Sri Lanka and Caritas Indonesia together with myself as their president.  Regional Coordinator, Mr. Zar Gomez also joined the meeting.  Prior to the Repco, all the seven regional presidents of Caritas together with the president of the Caritas Internationalis, Cardinal Maradiaga and Mr. Roy, the secretary general, were invited by Pontifical Council Cor Unum to share ideas on the revised statues and internal rules of Caritas Internationalis in which the Pontifical Council was assigned as office in charge of Holy See for Caritas, both for International and regional one. 

On Thursday morning, participants of the Repco were invited to visit Casa Santa Marta to have private audience with Holy Father.  I had attended such Papal audience several times but this one with Pope Francisco was different.  Pope shared his own ideas on charitable activities of the Church for 10 minutes and gave us chance to talk.  So all the regional presidents were invited to introduce respective regions for 5 minutes.  Then Mr. Roy presented a basket with bread an fish to symbolise the beginning of the international anti poverty campaign.  Then Holy Father gave yet another talk.  Then, of course, personal greetings and photo taking time.  Holy Father was really simple and kind.  He emphasised that we should not stop at the level of emergency relief effort but have to continue to walk along with people as the Good Samaritan did with a wounded man. (Holy Father spoke in Spanish this time. I did so in English as several others did and it seems Holy Father is not comfortable with English.)

Retreat completed@Charity Sisters of Ottawa in Sendai

I have been to Sendai for a week to preach a retreat for the Charity Sisters of Ottawa in Japan. I left Niigata immediately after the Niigata diocesan pastoral council on 29 April and just returned from Sendai this afternoon.  The retreat was the annual one for sisters and 15 of them, from Yamagata, Yokohama and Sendai communities, joined a full 7-day retreat.  This morning during 7am Mass, sisters renewed their religious Vows and were sent out to their respective apostolates.

I am not given a talent to be a spiritual director so that I can not give comprehensive spiritual direction through the retreat as such.  What I did was to give talks for 12 times, that is 2 talks a day, said daily Mass and preached, and met with each individual sisters to listen to their stories.  Mu talks are all based on my own experiences as a missionary priest in Ghana, Caritas volunteer in Rwanda refugees camp and Caritas director in various countries.  Because of these experiences, especially with Caritas Japan, I have given rich experiences of encounter with so many people in many countries.

You may find a familiar face among Sisters.  Ms. Sawako Inae who used be a program officer of Caritas Japan is now a novice in this congregation.  After the March 11 disaster in Japan, Sawako was sent to work in Sendai Diocese Support Center to coordinate relief efforts of Caritas and other players.  She stayed with Charity Sisters while she was in Sendai and was fascinated with the lives of religious community.  That is why she is now with them.  Kindly remember her, Sawako Inae, in your prayer so that she can follow the call of Jesus faithfully. 

Pastoral Visit of Sakata Church in Yamagata

On 14 April, Sunday, I made a pastoral visit of the Catholic community in city of Sakata in northern part of Yamagata prefecture.  It is around 4 hours drive from my house in Niigata.  Pastoral care of entire Yamagata prefecture has been entrusted to Picpus Fathers (SS.CC.) and there are 6 Catholic communities in the area with 3 Fathers of SS.CC. There is one priest residing in Yamagata parish and taking care of Yonezawa parish, and Shinjo station. Then there are 2 priests residing in Tsuruoka parish and taking care of Nagai station and Sakata station.  I am calling them as "station" because they do not have resident priest, however, following Japanese standard some of these stations, such as Shinjo and Sakata, could be Parishes in its own right.

Sakata used be a port city for a rich merchant of this area, Honma family, who used be called the biggest landlord of Japan for 200 years till the end of the WWII. Strong traditional culture and religion make Catholics quite difficult to bring Gospel message in this area so that the Catholic community in Sakata is quite small compare with parishes in other Christian countries. 

For my pastoral visit, around 20 Catholics attended Sunday Mass at 10am. The number was much more than ordinary Sunday.  After the Mass, I gave a talk on the Year of Faith and New Evangelisation.  Then we shared lunch, sung songs together.    

Sendai Diocese Support Meeting, held in Iwaki city

The Sendai Diocese Support Meeting was held in Iwaki city on 26 April, Friday, from 9:30 am to 3 pm.  This meeting was the 20th gathering of this group since the massive disaster in Tohoku on 11 March, 2011. Iwaki city is in Fukushima Prefecture and around 40 to 50 km south of Fukushima No1 Nuclear Power Station which is still under critical condition after the Tsunami disaster.  Within Iwaki city, there are 13 groups of temporary housings for evacuees.  Some of them are housed in private apartments which had been hired by local governments.  According to the government's statistics, more than three hundred and then thousand people are still unable to return to their original area in entire disaster hit area in Tohoku.  Most of the disaster hit area is in Sendai diocese.

 

The meeting was chaired by Bishop Hiraga of Sendai and attended by 17 plus participants including 5 Bishops. This monthly meeting is to coordinate relief efforts of Catholic Church in Japan within Sendai Diocese.  Three ecclesiastical provinces, Tokyo, Osaka and Nagasaki had established their volunteer bases and have been sending team of volunteers to support people.  These provinces were represented by Bishop Koda, Bishop Suwa and Bishop Hamaguchi respectively. I represented Bishops' Conference relief team with Fr. Kanda and Mr Hamaguchi, both from Osaka and Fr. Narui, SVD who had been a director of Sendai Support Center and the director of Caritas Japan till the end of March.  Though Fr. Narui has been appointed as JPIC coordinator for entire SVD (Divine Word Missionaries) congregation, he may help us as a member of my team as far as his time permits.

We met for this meeting in the "Mominoki Support Station" in Iwaki city run by Saitama diocese as a base for volunteers and also to invite people to come and relax with cup of coffee. The center itself is a beautiful log cabin while we could still see a number of temporary housings around the area.

At the beginning of this meeting, two people from Okuma town shared their stories after the disaster. Okuma town is where four of 6 power plants of Fukushima No.1 Nuclear Power Station are located and, as it is now, 96% of the area is closed for civilians to enter.  These two mothers of young kids from Okuma town had to evacuate from their homes after the accident of nuclear power plants and unable to return since then.

Caritas Japan's Easter video message

Following is a three-minute video message on Easter by myself as the president of Caritas Japan.