Feb. 13-18, 2012
Nav Sadhana offers two courses for Novices every year: one is on Scripture and another on Church History or Christology in every alternate year. This year the Church History was conducted from Feb. 13 to 18, 2012.
Like the birds of different places, Thirty Eight Novices of six congregations – FMM, HC, OSF of Dilingan or Bilaspur, OSF of Raipur, and UMI – converged in the campus of Nav Sadhana on Feb. 12, 2012 to attend the class on the Church History, which was taught by Rev.Fr. Jyotilal, IMS, Provincial of Varanasi Province of IMS and Professor of RTC, IMS, Varanasi.
From his wealth of knowledge on the Church History, he shed light on the origin of Christianity and formation of the Christian (Catholic) Church. The Novices realized that though the church was persecuted in the initial period, faith of Christians was strong, stable, firm, undeterred and undiminishing, and finally died for their faith. A Novice said, “After knowing the past centuries of our Church, the zeal and love for the Church in us increased and we felt one with our Universal Church. We are grateful to Fr. Jyotilal for his systematic and well planned teaching with power point presentation.” Another Novice said, “A deeper insight into the history of the Church and zeal of the early Christians enkindled in us the love for the Church and increased our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.”
They have realized the power of God operative in the Church in spite of human weakness and frailty predominant at time in the history; the failure is due to ignorance of priests and religious regarding Scripture and Guiding Hand of God; However, the Lord Jesus sustains the Church raising men and women of exemplary life as per need of the time and age. At the end of the class they came to the grip of their responsibility in holding up the charism of the congregation and the Church in collaboration with and listening to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. The novices expressed their gratitude to the Nav Sadhana Staff for making their stay comfortable and providing ambrosial meals, favourable and congenial atmosphere. Thanks be to God.
The clarion call of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to youth, “THE CHURCH LOOKS AT YOU WITH CONFIDENCE AND WITH LOVE” is applicable to the Novices, who are future pillars of the Church.
