Fiji Catholic Women's League in Savusavu this Year 2011

Catholic women converge

Salaseini Vosamana
Wednesday, August 24, 2011

MORE than 1500 Catholic women nationwide are expected to converge at St Andrews Parish in Savarekareka, Savusavu, this weekend for their annual conference.

The women will elect new office bearers and discuss development plans for the Catholic Women's League.

League president Susana Evening said the women from the 35 parishes throughout the country had anticipated the three-day event to fundraise and socialise with other parishioners.

Delegates are expected to start arriving today and the function starts on Friday.

"We will be discussing issues such as child protection, human trafficking, sexual assault and foremost we'll be fundraising to raise funds for our organisation. Part of the funds collected will also be directed to the Archbishop Petero Mataca to assist the seminarians with their education."

Holy Family Catholic Women's League president Selina Lee Wah said women would showcase some of their handicraft at the craft exhibition on Saturday to promote the talents and skills they have.

"Apart from the workshop and the fundraising drive, the meeting will also see to the enhancement of our individual spiritual growth. The Northern women are looking forward to a better celebration this year and we encourage the participation of more women because this meet only happens once in a year," Ms Lee Wah said.

Take The World Youth Day Experience Back Home, Says Pope Benedict

22-August-2011 -- Catholic News Agency

MADRID, SPAIN, August 21 (CNA/EWTN News) - Pope Benedict XVI left Spain on the evening of August 21, after giving a challenge to the million-plus young people who came to World Youth Day in Madrid over the past six days.

"Now I ask you to spread throughout the world the profound and joyful experience of faith which you had here in this noble country," said the Pope, on the tarmac at Madrid's Barajas Airport.

"By your closeness and your witness, help your friends to discover that loving Christ means living life to the full."

Pope Benedict led nine events during his four-day visit for World Youth Day. The peak moment was Sunday's Mass at Cuarto Vientos airbase, with a congregation said to contain up to 2 million people.

Spain's King Juan Carlos and Queen Sophia came to Barajas to bid the Pope farewell on behalf of the Spanish nation.

"Holiness, you have addressed words of love and hope, encouragement and confidence to a youth that treasures values like solidarity," said King Juan Carlos.

"I give the most heartfelt thanks for your visit to Spain. Thank you for the hope and the vision that you have given to our youth."

In response, the Pope told them that "Spain is a great nation whose soundly open, pluralistic and respectful society is capable of moving forward without surrendering its profoundly religious and Catholic soul."

The Pope thanked World Youth Day 2011's organizers, giving special mention to Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, President of the Pontifical Council for the Laity; Madrid's Cardinal Archbishop Antonio Rouco Varela; and the event's General Coordinator, Monsignor Cesar Augusto Franco Martinez.

About two hundred young people got to come onto the tarmac to wave goodbye to the Pope. As with his arrival at the same location, he was "protected" by a line of mini-Swiss Guards, Spanish schoolboys dressed in the uniforms of the illustrious Vatican army.

"I leave Spain very happy and grateful to everyone," said the Pope.

"But above all I am grateful to God, our Lord, who allowed me to celebrate these days so filled with enthusiasm and grace, so charged with dynamism and hope."

He said the past week's "feast of faith" should inspire "great confidence" in God's love and care, keeping the Church "young and full of life, even as she confronts challenging situations."

"This is the work of the Holy Spirit, who makes Jesus Christ present in the hearts of young people in every age and shows them the grandeur of the divine vocation given to every man and woman."

The Pope said that young people respond when "one proposes to them, in sincerity and truth, an encounter with Jesus Christ, the one redeemer of humanity."

He concluded by urging the bishops of the world, and teachers of the faith at every level, to build on the lessons that young people have received in Madrid.

"Do not be afraid to present to young people the message of Jesus Christ in all its integrity, and to invite them to celebrate the sacraments by which he gives us a share in his own life."

The Pope then departed on his chartered Alitalia flight which will return him to Rome this evening.

And so ended World Youth Day 2011. Its effects around the world may have just begun.

At Closing Mass, Pope Tells Youth To Follow Christ Through His Church

22-August-2011 -- Catholic News Agency

MADRID, SPAIN, August 21 (CNA/EWTN News) -
Pope Benedict XVI told over a million young pilgrims to World Youth Day that the best way to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is through the Catholic Church.

"Following Jesus in faith means walking at his side in the communion of the Church. We cannot follow Jesus on our own," he said in his homily at the event's closing Mass at Cuarto Vientos airbase on the outskirts of Madrid.

"Anyone who would be tempted to do so 'on his own,' or to approach the life of faith with the kind of individualism so prevalent today, will risk never truly encountering Jesus, or will end up following a counterfeit Jesus."

The Pope delivered his sermon in the searing heat of the morning, a contrast to the thunderstorm he'd endured during a prayer vigil at the same venue the night before.

"I hope you were able to sleep a bit," said the Pope to the young people just before Mass. He encouraged them to leave Madrid "firm in the faith," in keeping with the event's theme of becoming strongly rooted in Christ.

Remarkably, the young pilgrims seemed unfazed by both extremes of weather, greeting the Pope's arrival with a sea of world flags and cheers of "El Papa! Viva!"

The Pope drew his message from the day's Gospel reading, in which St. Peter responds to Jesus's question "Who do you say that I am?" with the answer, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Christ, in turn, proclaims: "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it."

"The Church, then, is not simply a human institution, like any other. Rather, she is closely joined to God," said the Pope.

"Christ himself speaks of her as 'his' Church. Christ cannot be separated from the Church any more than the head can be separated from the body. The Church does not draw her life from herself, but from the Lord."

In the presence of King Juan Carlos and Queen Sophia of Spain, the Pope said the Catholic Church is the answer to a question that often arises today.

"There are many people today who feel attracted by the figure of Christ and want to know him better," realizing that "he is the answer to so many of our deepest concerns. But who is he really? How can someone who lived on this earth so long ago have anything in common with me today?"

The answer, said the Pope, was Christ's presence continuing through history in the Catholic Church.

The universality of that Church showed throughout the Mass, with readings and prayers delivered in an array of languages including Spanish, Italian, Polish, Arabic, Chinese, and the Church's traditional Latin. In fact, like many World Youth Day events, the Papal liturgy combined traditional and more modern Catholic elements.

The Pope told young people that they, like Peter, "have been given the extraordinary task of being disciples and missionaries of Christ" - in their case, missionaries to their peers who "are looking for something greater and, because their heart tells them that more authentic values do exist, they do not let themselves be seduced by the empty promises of a lifestyle which has no room for God."

"The world needs the witness of your faith, it surely needs God," said the Pope, "I think that the presence here of so many young people, coming from all over the world, is a wonderful proof of the fruitfulness of Christ's command to the Church: 'Go into all the world and proclaim the Gospel to the whole creation.'"

The only disappointment for many pilgrims was that most were unable to receive Communion during Mass. This was due to the fact that many of the 17 Eucharistic chapels around the venue had blown down in last night's storm while others had to be dismantled due to safety fears.

Pope Benedict ended by telling the young people that he prayed for them "with heartfelt affection," that they would "grow in holiness of life" and "be effective witnesses to the truth that Jesus Christ is indeed the Son of God, the savior of all mankind and the living source of our hope. Amen."