Taiping Catholic Church (1997)
(St. Louis & Our Lady of the Sacred Heart)
Parish Priest : Rev. David Lourdes
Parish Secretariat is at St. Louis
Church of St. Louis (1897)
288 Jalan Convent, 34000 Taiping , Perak
T: 05-8072786
F: 05-8077786
Email: stlouis@tm.net.my
Sat. Novena & Benediction: 6.15 pm
Sat. Sunset Mass: 7.00 pm
Sunday Mass : 9.45 am (1st & 3rd Sun. in Tami; 2nd & 4th in Englishl)
Church of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart (1875)
Klian Pau, 34000 Taiping, Perak
Sunday Mass :
8.15 am (1st & 3rd Sun. in Mandarin; 2nd & 4th Sun. in English)
St Peter's Chapel, Kuala Sepetang: 8.00 pm (1st Sun.)
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Using the Word of God to grow into a loving community |
| Posted by Diocese of Penang (pgdiocese) on Jan 19 2009 |
December 07, 2008
TAIPING: The Taiping Catholic Church held its annual parish assembly on Nov 16. Parish priest Fr David Lourdes explained that it is a deep faith in Jesus Christ that elicits a person’s response to Christ’s invitation to be totally His disciple throughout the person’s life. He said, “It is a struggle to act on the Word of God and is fraught with repeated failures. The Spirit is with us now to enable us to become a better Christian community.”
Queenie James, the Parish Pastoral Council chairperson, proceeded to evaluate the three parish events of the year, namely, parish feastday, Bible Sunday and cultural night. There were too many events and there was no coordination among the activities of the various parish organizations, chapels, and that of the zone and BEC levels. The dates of the events were so close to each other that planning of the next event had to start before the impact of the preceding event could sink in.
Reporting on the state of the BECs, BEC committee chairman, Francis Fernandez, revealed that the 902 families of the Taiping Catholic parish were demarcated into 11 zones with each zone comprising of between two to seven BECs. Of the 49 BECs, 36 BECs had leadership presence and 13 BECs did not have leaders. The average attendance of BEC gatherings was 25 per cent of the BEC population.
Cyril Sandanasamy of the parish animating team conducted the process of prioritization of the multifarious issues of the parish that needed urgent attention. The Parish Animating Team had earlier collated and classified the returns from the BECs and organizations and listed the issues into strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. (SWOT). Each list contained between 12 to 36 items.
The major weaknesses of the BECs were: Indifference in attitude, failure to realize the importance of the BEC and fear of sharing. These situations threatened the relationships of love, mutual understanding, and acceptance among BEC members built up through participation in the BECs. Gossip, backbiting and disparaging remarks by those not involved with the BECs gave rise to a negative perception of the BECs, causing conflicts, misunderstanding and loss of sense of belonging to the BEC and church. As a result some members withheld support and cooperation with the BEC teams.
Most organisations of the parish have national and international affiliations and support outside the parochial jurisdiction. Their strengths lay in their commitment and faithfulness to their charismas and particular rules of their organizations and well-organised teamwork. They prayed, cared for others, and shared the Word of God at their regular meetings, fostered friendship, reached out to lapsed Catholics, and developed spiritual enrichment programmes for adults and children.
Advancing age of the members of the organizations and diminishing membership threatened the existence of the organizations in the parish. Spiritual renewal and formation were insufficient and new and young parishioners were not attracted to their fold.
Based on the Penang Diocesan theme, Deepening our Discipleship — Spirituality of Communion, and drawing from the assembly’s process of selection of impressions of current parish situations requiring priority attention, Fr David marked out the parish thrust for 2009 thus, With Christ the Word, We grow into a Loving, Caring Community.
— By Raphael A.T.Ng
Last changed: Jan 19 2009 at 5:13 PM
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