Todonyang Mission is a reference of hope and peace at the border between the Turkana (from Kenya) and the Dassanech (from Ethiopia). The mission has always stood against conflict by promoting peace, development and education.

On the ocasion of World Peace Day, Todonyang Integrated Centre celebrated
in style with the slogan “Peace is All We Need”.

The day started with a procession, followed by the planting of a tree as a symbol of peace. The school children then put on different presentations of poems, songs and dances.

Around 250 people came for the occasion and they all received a meal.

In the afternoon we had various sports such as football and volleyball. These sports were played between 3 teams: the General Service Unit (special soldiers deployed at the border areas), Todonyang youth and students from Todonyang Integrated Centre.

Let us all continue to pray and work for peace.

Peace is all we need!!!

Fr. Andrew Yakulula, MCSPA.

When we started the Mission of Nariokotome way back in 1989, our founder, Fr. Francisco Andreo (Paco), had the idea of turning this place into a self-sufficient mission. This was to prove that through hard work, abundant water, fertile land, plenty of sunshine and above all trusting in God, we would be able to produce food despite the contrary opinion.

Hence, agriculture evolved into a crucial activity at Nariokotome Mission. Currently there are more than 4,000 fruit trees here, of which 1,500 are vines.

When I first came to Nariokotome in November 1998, I was very surprised to see and taste for the first time fruits such as grapes, olives, figs, custard apples, dates … just to mention but a few. I had only read about them in books at schools down at “civilised” Nairobi!

A land – hot and dry, apparently barren – could be made to produce food! This was mind-blowing for me, a young girl just out from school. This fact continues to surprise many visitors and locals who come to our missions and find available vegetables, fruit, poultry and other sources of food.

Just this week, we are blessed with a harvest of 510 kgs of grapes (Alicante, Sirach and Barbera) and 100 kgs of table grapes (Murcia, Lambrusco, Regina Italia) … this does not take into account the grapes which the birds have been feeding on for the past 2 months! The member in-charge of agriculture at Nariokotome, Patrizia Aniballi, pruned the vines 3 months ago and now we have harvested the grapes and are starting the process of making wine, as we have done for many years already. With each harvest, we are trying to improve on the quality.

The grapes are harvested bunch by bunch, and gently placed into the buckets. Then they are washed, separated from the stems, crushed and placed in a huge container for fermentation to take place. They will then be separated by squeezing and the liquid that will be collected with be placed in barrels to settle and after some months it will be bottled as “Nariokotome Vintage”.

Our aim is to produce twice the amount of grapes and be able to make altar wine and supply to the whole Diocese of Lodwar.

Lillian Omari MCSPA
Nariokotome Mission

Missio Aachen, the Pontifical Missionary Society of Germany has chosen Ethiopia this year as their focus country. A delegation of the Ethiopian Church has been invited to Germany to encourage Catholic donors to link up the money they donate with the reality of people, projects and the country.

Among the delegates are His Emminence Cardinal Berhaneyesus from Addis Ababa, and Bishops Markos from Jimma-Bonga, and Bishop Seyoum from Hossaina. Frs. David Escrich and Angel Valdivia from Nyangatom are representing our MCSPA missions in Ethiopia. Missio supports many social and pastoral projects around Africa and Asia every year.

This year’s Mission Sunday campaign opening has been launched in Erfurt Diocese and the celebration has been full of joy and entertainment. Activities such as a race competition to collect money were organised after the mass. Even those who wanted to have their shoes cleaned could do it as a donation because the Bishop of Erfurt was one of the cleaners! We are all called to serve.

Fr. Angel Valdivia MCSPA

These past 2 weeks, 55 youth are attending a Summer Camp at the St. Joseph’s Mother and Child Centre, that the MCSPA is running at Muketuri.

We started this Centre in 2008 and, in order to celebrate the 10th anniversary of its founding, we organised a summer camp for former students and youth from the area. Our aim was to encourage them to create the “St. Joseph Youth Group”.
This activity was organised by some members of the Catholic Scout Movement from Spain together with members of MCSPA present at Muketuri.

The main idea is to create awareness among Ethiopian youth about their potential in volunteer work as promoters of change among children, youth and families of the area.

Different activities have been organised: sports, drama, fabrication of musical instruments with recycled material etc.

The topics of the drama plays have been chosen by the participants themselves with the idea to present them at the different villages and schools: How to fight gender discrimination; Importance of hygiene; Causes and consequences of child malnourishment; Peace and conflict resolution; Inclusion of people with disabilities and Taking care of the environment.

The drama groups are presenting the topics in 5 villages and at Muketuri town to create awareness on these social realities and how the community can improve the situation.

It is the first time that an activity like this is being organised in the area and this has been an extraordinary opportunity for building up the local community.

Lourdes Larruy MCSPA

Apart from pursuing studies in Manila (Philippines), the members and apprentices of the MCSPA also carry out various apostolates at Payatas II and Parola (Gate 54). These are among the largest depressed neighbourhoods around Metro Manila (pop. 12.8 million in 2015). We do family visitations weekly at Payatas and also teach basic English and Math to the youth attending classes at centres initiated by the Salvatorian Fathers at Payatas and to young children at Gate 54 of Parola at a Livelihood Centre owned by the Salvatorian Fathers as well.

We also do have our own milk program in which supplementary powder milk is provided to malnourished, lactating children whose young mothers may not produce enough breast milk for their babies.

These weekly visitations have created a bond between us and several of these families, a bond that has endeared them to us and vice versa. We have become part of their lives and they take us as their own family. They share with us their joys and struggles of living in such squalid conditions.

This is why when Aries Aquino, a teenaged boy from one of the families at Payatas, fell sick of leptospirosis, a bacterial infection due to contact with contaminated water containing the urine from rodents, his mother called us in the middle of the night to go help her son who was admitted at the hospital. His kidney was almost failing. We did whatever we could to help alleviate the pain of the boy; he had to undergo dialysis in order for his kidneys to recover. Aries has now been discharged from the hospital and is recovering at home.

These trying days for Aries and his family and for us too have taught me that no one can serve perfectly. But what is important is that one has to experience his or her ministry as a call from Christ. We are loved by Christ and called to live a life of service; we do not serve simply because it is good to do so. Rather, we serve because in love we have been called and our response is to choose to return love.

Victor Otieno, MCSPA

A team of 25 young adults from Our Lady of the Rosary Parish of Kiambu (Kenya) visited Todonyang Mission where they stayed for 5 days. The group of young professionals accompanied Fr. Andrew and the MCSPA team at Todonyang to the outstations, animated devotional activities, gave talks on the dangers of alcoholism, helped at the primary school and dispensary etc.

It was good to have this enterprising group of young people around to share their deep faith.

Fr. Andrew Yakulula MCSPA

The Feast of St. Clare was a memorable and joyful day for 12 women and their children of a village at Mizan Teferi that is named after St. Clare.

MCSPA members have been supporting these women and their children who live together in a closed and isolated village. This is because these women had suffered from leprosy and after a long period of medication their leprosy was cured but people still shunned them because they continued to be considered as contagious. Their village was named after St. Clare in the hope that the saint might intercede for them and accompany them in their daily life. We have been supporting them with medical expenses and clothing, teaching them health and hygiene, and spending time with them by accompanying them to the hospital and doing different activities.

One of the women, named Dafaat, asked, “Who are you people that you care for me and even accompany me to the hospital, something which even my children cannot do most times?”

We answered that it is the love of God that is uniting us together so that we can help one another because we need each other to lean on. Jesus died for all of us because He loved us.

One doesn’t have to be a super-woman or man to help. All it takes is a generous heart that is ready to share the little that it possesses, and these are the talents.

Once we truly live out our experiences, we become aware that we cannot let things remain the way they are, forgetting what we have experienced and seen. Instead, we have to participate and share, even if it is just a minute of listening to the other person. It is empathy that brings us together and helps us to be united with each other.

Esther Kerubo

As you recently read, one of the projects which the engineers from P.U.M., that are collaborating with the Mission of Nyangatom, is a road that connects the Mission with Naita (border with South Sudan). A few days ago we decided to kill two birds with one stone: reopen an old road for the Nyangatom that inhabit Naita, as well as start taking measures for the engineering project.

We prepared an expedition to spend the night out, composed of 17 persons, members of the mission and, thanks to the advice of Lore (a local worker at the mission), some local people who knew how to use a machete, and he was more than right! Almost the whole journey consisted in breaking through forests of thorny bushes. After a day and a half of expedition and clearing 17 kms, we decided to end this first journey, when we arrived at the banks of a dry riverbed, at the foot of the Tepes mountains.

All this effort had its reward, and just before lunch we enjoyed a swim in the natural pools of Nachich, which was a real gift. After the swim some of the local inhabitants were waiting for us under the shade of some trees. They could not believe that two cars had made it there! After conversing for a while they challenged us saying that they would only contribute to continue opening the road with us if our cars crossed the dry stream. So we stood up and hands on and we built an “Irish bridge” and cleared the road to the other side of rocks and trees. The bridge was a success, the cars crossed and the Nyangatom of Tepes have committed to help us clear the way so that next week, we can continue with the second journey to Naita.

Carlos Rueda Bueno,
Civil Engineer

Two years ago we met Bilise, a 5-year-old girl. Her mother, Workinesh, brought her to Andode Health Post because the child had a fever. She was severely malnourished and with bone deformation in all her body due to rickets and pneumonia. Then, she was very fragile and it was almost a miracle that she was still alive. She was crying, because of the pain and the difficulty in breathing.

When Workinesh was pregnant, her partner left her and since then, she worked as a day labourer carrying Bilise on her back while working. She had totally lost hope and thought that her daughter’s only destiny would be death.

But Bilise resisted the enormous malnutrition and pneumonia. They began to live in one of the rooms that the MCSPA built in the compound of Andode Health Post to monitor severely malnourished children and their mothers, women with complications of pregnancy who need rest and good nutrition and the chronically ill who need daily medical control and who live far from the health post.

When Bilise improved and began to smile and talk (by the way, she speaks a lot these days!), Workinesh completely changed her attitude to the care of her daughter. Previously, she did not follow the medical instructions for the treatment of Bilise.

In this way, they started to live again, both Bilise and her mother. Our little one is now 7 years old and goes to the MCSPA nursery at Andode, very close to the health post. She is one of the best students, because of her interest in learning and her desire to play and live.

For me, it has been a precious gift from God, to have been able to continue caring for both Bilise and Workinesh, who now helps in the agricultural work of Andode Mission and has discovered her dignity as a woman and mother.

THANK YOU BILISE, WORKINESH AND ALL THOSE WHO COLLABORATED AND WHO CONTINUE TO HELP IN THEIR CARE AND MEDICAL TREATMENT!

Maria Josefa Nuñez (Pepi) MCSPA