Below are stories from past issues of Columban Mission magazine. The Columban Fathers publish Columban Mission magazine eight times a year. Subscriptions are available for just $15 per year. Sign up to receive our next issue. Read more about Columban Mission magazine.
I never thought that my photo would be on the front cover of a book – admittedly with fourteen others! All of us, in our 80s, are foreign missionaries still working in Japan.
Part of life while growing up was the occasional phone call I would receive from my uncle, Columban Fr. Tomás King, who is a missionary priest in Pakistan.
This is the night,when Christ broke the prison-bars of death and rose victorious from the underworld.
“Ever seen a mushroom grow? asked our gardener one morning in the grounds of the Columban Center House in Peru, as he pointed out to some of us a particularly fine example. “Sprouts up overnight. Incredible.” “Hmmm, just like Lima,” observed Fr. Dermot Carthy. He should know.
“Memories Are Made of This,” go the words of the old song.
Like many other Columban missionaries before me, I have devoted many years to trying to promote harmonious relations between Christians and Muslims in the Southern Philippines, a place that has witnessed much misunderstanding and conflict between adherents of these two world religions.
Razia is a Pakistani woman of small stature and big heart. She has known the Columbans since about 1985, and from that time, has been involved in bringing education to the women and children of brick kiln workers in the villages around her home in Jiunpura, Sheikhupura, Punjab Province.
We always hear the expression “Time flies!” and indeed that is true. In 2020, I suddenly realized that I was already celebrating my 10th anniversary as Columban Lay Missionary. Truly, it is amazing how by God’s grace I made it this long, which I myself did not expect.
Recently Pope Francis said, “Kindness frees us from the cruelty that at times infects human relationships, from the anxiety that prevents us from thinking of others, from the frantic flurry of activity that forgets that others also have a right to be happy.” Wow!
The village of Parola, Tondo, Philippines, is a shantytown where the Pasig River and Manila Bay waters meet. It has been five years since a huge fire completely gutted it.
The Columbans are a society of missionaries, including priests and lay people, who minister to people of various cultures as a way of witnessing to the universal love of God.