The OCDS members
By Catherine Wan
March 21 2022
KOTA KINABALU – As the Holy Father called on the entire Church to “walk together”, and to reflect on the theme chosen by him “For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation and Mission” in anticipation of the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops in October 2023, KK OCDS community responded and organized the Synodal Process for its members on Mar 12.
Despite the challenge of the pandemic, 21 members turned up for the event under prevailing SOP.
Coordinator of the event, Mary Lee, briefed the gathering on the flow of the program. The process began with the para-liturgy of the Bible Enthronement, followed by invoking the Holy Spirit and reciting the “Adsumus Sancte Spiritus” for guidance on the synodal consultation.
Relating to the gospel proclamation from Luke 24:13-35, Fr Mattheus Luta, who accompanied the community during the process, encouraged the participants to share their experience of being Church, just as the two disciples did on the way to Emmaus.
Briefing by the priest
He emphasized the importance of listening to each other during the consultative process, declaring that the whole process was not about producing documents but to build a synodal church that encourages the participation of the grassroot in the dialogue of their faith experience.
The participants then proceeded to small group sharing on questions related to the theme based on the three main elements of a Synodal Church – “Communion, Participation and Mission”.
Each group comprising 10-11 members shared freely about their experience of being Church in a time span of two hours. From the sharing, the participants were able to perceive a better perspective of one another‘s journey as church.
A short report was presented by the respective group facilitator on the sharing of the members. The process concluded with a blessing from Fr Mattheus, and an acknowledgement of thanksgiving to Mother Mary with the song Salve Regina for her accompaniment throughout their synodal journey.
After lunch, the community spent a moment to nominate a candidate to represent the KK OCDS community in the election of the National Council during the upcoming Malaysia OCDS Congress end of April and early May.
