OUR LADY COMES HOME.

 From September 9 onwards, the statues of Mother Mary make the rounds of various SCCs -Small Christian Communities (somudais) of our parish, as in all other parishes of Goa. It is  a special time of grace for families to come together in prayer and fellowship. The Catholic Church created the Small Christian Communities to establish brotherhood and unity in neighbourhoods. 

11 Oct 2023

Today, I visited the home of Alba from the Milagres Colony somudai. I will be receiving the statue from her tomorrow. 

When I went to her home today, I was pleasantly surprised to see a stray dog in her backyard. Upon inquiry, I learnt that she and another family feed and shelter this dog. It looked old and weak so I am assuming it has reached the last lap of its journey on earth. 

We went to get the statue from another home, the dwelling place of a lady named Jessica. And lo and behold! Here too there was a stray dog in their compound looked after by the family. 

We went in procession after final prayers at Jessica's place. The rosary and litany were recited, interspersed with hymns. Alba served some refreshments and then we returned home. 

12 Oct

We cleaned and decorated the altar and dining table with garlands and artificial flowers to welcome Our Lady to our home. By 5 pm, Glenn and Dan went to get the statue. Alba and Victor came with them and we started the rosary. Our building neighbours also had come as did Moses. 

We had to pray our own welcome prayer which I downloaded from a Salesian website. We prayed intentions too. We alternated between English and Konkani for the decades. All our family members led one decade - the boys in English and Glenn and myself in Konkani. I did not have the Litany so Alba recited it in Konkani from memory. 

After that, we served egg and cheese sandwiches and Sprite. That ended the community rosary. Fr Robin, our parish priest, has urged us to say all four rosaries when the statue visits the home so we will say one tonight, the second tomorrow morning and the last in the afternoon. Tomorrow is also our Consecration anniversary so we will say the Consecration prayer.