Church without frontiers — celebrating Migrant Sunday

Around 200 migrants, refugees and displaced persons celebrated Migrant Sunday at the Church of Our Lady of Fatima, Brickfields, with the theme Church without frontiers, Mother to All, on Sunday, Sept 27 at the 10.30am Mass.

Oct 07, 2015

By Francis Magimay
Around 200 migrants, refugees and displaced persons celebrated Migrant Sunday at the Church of Our Lady of Fatima, Brickfields, with the theme Church without frontiers, Mother to All, on Sunday, Sept 27 at the 10.30am Mass.

The entrance procession included the migrants, who carried their national flags which were later placed at the left side of the sanctuary.

Parish priest Fr Ferdinand Magimay, in his opening address quoted, “Anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to Christ will certainly not lose his reward” (Mark (9:41). He emphasized that every small act of kindness or charity we do for others will have eternal consequences.

The migrants and refugees animated the Mass. Martin Forgiot, from France, read the first reading from the Book of Numbers. Judith Pay, from the Philippines, read the second reading from the Book of James.

In his homily, Fr Ferdinand narrated a story about nine paraplegics of varying ages, who took part in a race. They assembled at the starting line, waiting for the gun to signal the start of the race. At the sound of the signal, they started to run, but they heard someone crying. One girl turned and saw a boy on the ground. He was crying. She rushed over, bent down and kissed him, encouraged him to stand up and continue with the race. The others seeing the girl’s compassion, also turned back, lifted up the boy, linked hands and all walked together to the finishing line. The spectators stood up and gave a thunderous applause. The judge, seeing that all nine reached the finishing line at the same time, declared that all of them would get prizes.

Fr Ferdinand said that what matters in life is helping others to win as well, as we do. He gave another example of a lighted candle. It can light another one or two or even a hundred other candles, without losing its own light. He repeated: small actions have eternal consequences.

Touching on the Gospel (Mark 9: 43-47), he explained the passage that said, “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.... if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off… if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out...” He said that we should not do this literally. What we ought to do is to cut off the action that leads us to sin. Cut off the occasion to sin. Cut off the companions who lead us to sin. Thus, we will participate in the Kingdom of God.

In the Prayer of the Faithful, the migrant and refugee community said the six invocations, in six different languages — Russian, Vietnamese, Telegu, French, Tagalog, and Burmese.

After the final blessing, all the migrants and refugees adjourned to Dewan Fatima, where Lucien Wijesuria, the Coordinator of the Migrant Ministry, welcomed our international friends on behalf of the Parish Priest. He also thanked them for participating and animating the Eucharist. He said that we all belong to the one community, united in Jesus Christ.

He also touched on Pope Francis’ message on Migrant Sunday and invited everyone to lunch at St Joseph’s Hall. On the right hand side of the Church, a band called The Copy Cats performed a variety of hit songs. During lunch, the coordinating team gave away prizes to those seated on chairs with lucky numbers pasted under each. After lunch, there were games, songs, dances and more entertainment.

One refugee family, Mr and Mrs Samuel Khruirrah, with his two children and his mother, came from Rawalpindi, Pakistan, under the UNHCR Programme. He said his family has been in Malaysia for about a year. When asked why they came, he said that their life in Pakistan had become unbearable. They had to move often in order to avoid persecution for being Christians. He decided to migrate with his family members. He hoped UNHCR would find them a country to settle down and alleviate their sufferings.

Total Comments:0

Name
Email
Comments