KUALA LUMPUR: A group of indigenous Orang Asli Christians has demanded that the local authorities restore water and electricity so that can use their church which was wrongfully torn down, their lawyer said. Local authorities in Pahang tore down the church used by the Orang Asli in 2003 but the federal government stepped in and gave them RM35,000 as compensation to rebuild their house of worship. But the local government has refused to connect utilities to the building preventing the community from using it for more than a year. The Orang Asli have now taken the matter to the Temerloh High Court, their lawyer Annou Xavier said.

PORT DICKSON: The Church of the Holy Family held a formation-cum-retreat for its leaders from April 25 to 27 at the NUBE Training Centre. Forty-two people turned up, comprising members of the PPC, PCC, PFC, BECAT, ministry heads and the 14 zone leaders. The talks over the three days included Group Dynamics and Interpersonal Skills by Agatha Tan; and Our Journey as Church in Peninsular Malaysia by Richard Chia.

SHAH ALAM: Archbishop Murphy Pakiam was at Montfort Boys Town to preside over a special Eucharistic Celebration for the feasts of St Louis Marie De Montfort, who is the patron of Montfort Boys Town, and St Magdalene of Canossa, the foundress of the Canossian Daughters of Charity. Fr Anthony Chan On Dong, Fr Frederick Joseph and Fr George Harrison concelebrated at the April 28 celebration. Among those present at Mass were the Brothers of Montfort, Canossian Sisters, Daughters of St Paul, La Salle Brothers together with Christian staff members of MBT and trainee students who filled the small chapel to full capacity. It was the 200th anniversary of the foundation of the Canossian Order. In his homily, Archbishop Pakiam emphasised that we are all very much loved by our Father in heaven despite our limitations.

KELANA JAYA: On May 4, the St Ignatius Church Junior Youth Ministry organized a Workshop on Teen Sexuality at the Costantini Community Centre. The workshop, for youth between 15 and 24, was conducted by Sr Angeline Lau, a Good Shepherd religious and certified family therapist, psychologist and counselor with a master's degree in these fields. The workshop was aimed at bringing to light the reality of our sexuality as well as the consequences of misusing it. About 60 people turned up for the workshop.

PETALING JAYA: About 150 people gathered recently for a vigil in preparation for the Feast of Pentecost at the Loyola Hall in the Church of St Francis Xavier, Petaling Jaya. Led by Martin Jalleh and assisted by the SFX Charismatic Prayer Group, the participants kept vigil with the Lord through Praise and Worship sessions, silent adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and intercessory prayers. Parish priest Fr Simon Yong shared on the significance of Pentecost and especially it being the birthday of the Church. Jalleh said that the message and meaning of Pentecost becomes all the more relevant today especially when seen in the light of the disturbing signs of the "Last Days."

Vision without values is risky, whereas values without vision goes nowhere. When vision and values are aligned, we arrive at our desired destination.
This was stated by Yazdi Jehangir Bankwala, pic, principal consultant at Arpitha Associates in Singapore and Malaysia, when presenting a workshop on Communicating Values Clarification for catechists on 26 April at Cahayasuara Communications Centre.
"Our vision shows us our desired destination or where to go, while our values point out how to arrive at the intended situation," said Yazdi, who has been involved in the vision-values field for more than 12 years.
Yazd's workshop programme on Vision-Values was based on the pioneering work of Dr J. M. Sampath, who developed a Model of Excellence based on his research and observation in individual and organizational development.
Yazdi challenged participants to live the values before imparting them, and to "create" excellent students in their catechism classes by practising "vision-values leadership." Such leadership, he clarified, required four vital components: vision, values, clarity and context.
"Clarity in this leadership scenario means understanding why we want to achieve a certain goal, while context tells us what to do and how to act in a particular situation or reality," explained Yazdi, who provides training and consultancy in the area of Transformation, Values and Change for organisations.

During his May 7 general audience in St Peter’s Square, the Pope called on people to open their hearts “to compassion and generosity so that with the collaboration of all who are able and want to lend help, the suffering caused by this huge tragedy can be alleviated.
When the pope spoke, more than 22,000 people had been killed, 41,000 were missing and 1 million were homeless after the cyclone’s heavy rains and winds of up to 120 mph swept over southern Myanmar on May 1.
The cyclone damaged at least three major cities, including Yangon, the capital of Myanmar and its largest city

The Single Adult Ministry of the Church of the Divine Mercy, SAMsterz, organised a 13-week Environment Campaign in the parish. All geared in Green, the SAMsterz illustrated an excellent example showing our significant concern in organizing an environment campaign called ‘SAMsterz Go Green' to raise awareness on environmental issues among the parishioners as well as to prevent the destruction of mother nature, God's wonderful creation.
The Environment Campaign was launched on January 6, by parish priest, Fr Paulino Miranda. A ten minute slide presentation on Environmental issues was shown during Mass to mark the launch of the campaign.
A booth was set up to collect recyclable items during the weekends. This project was spearheaded by Andrew Lee and was entirely supported by all the members who took turns to be on duty every weekend ensuring that the collections were carried out successfully.
The funds generated was approximately RM1,425.00 which was meant to be used for charity

Court of Kuala Lumpur on Monday (May 5) allowed the Catholic Church leave to proceed with its bid to unshackle the government's gag order prohibiting it from using the word "Allah" in its HERALD through a judicial review.
The Government had earlier argued that t Church's application is frivolous and had urge the court to throw it out but Madam Justice Lau Bee Lan disagreed and allowed the application by the Titular Roman Catholic Archbishop Kuala Lumpur, Datuk Murphy Pakiam, for leave to sue the government regarding the use of the word "Allah".
The suit was filed against the Internal Security Minister who was previously Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi but now Syed Hamid Albar and the Federal Government. The Church is now to file application with the court for substantive hearing at a later date. The Church is represented Porres Royan, Leonard Teoh, S. Selvaraja Derek Fernandez and Annou Xavier while the respondents are represented by senior Federal Counsel Azizah Haji Nawawi and Suzan Atan.

On April 29 Justice Lau Bee Lan heard submissions from lawyers for both HERALD and the government.
In her submission, Azizah Haji Nawawi argued that HERALD's application for judicial review should be denied because:
> the declaration sought by HERALD allowing it to use "Allah" is a declaration of its private rights, and therefore should not be subject to judicial review because judicial reviews do not involve private rights.
> the,claims brought by HERALD require expert evidence, and that the evidence must be produced orally by expert witnesses; and
> HERALD's claim that the use of the word "Allah" is part of religious freedoms guaranteed under Article 11 of the Federal Constitution, as well as the claim that the word is an integral part of the Christian religion is a matter of fact which has to be supported by expert testimony and cannot be heard in a judicial review.

On Sunday, April 27, 61 youths and adults from the Church of St Thomas received the Sacrament of Confirmation.
The multilingual Mass was presided over by His Grace Archbishop Murphy Pakiam and concelebrated by Parish Priest Fr Eugene Benedict. The Eucharist was celebrated joyfully with parts of the liturgy and the hymns in various languages. In his homily, Archbishop Pakiam referred to the day's Gospel, John 14:15-21, in which Jesus says, "I will not leave you orphans" and reminded the congregation, especially the confirmands, to be constantly aware of the presence of Jesus in our lives. Amidst the turmoil and sinfulness in our lives, Jesus is always with us and has promised us an Advocate, the Holy Spirit to guide us.
After Mass, the Archbishop was invited to a potluck lunch with the parishioners and the confirmands and their families.

Although Easter was celebrated almost a month ago, the spirit of this celebration still burn in the hearts of many, particularly, the Youths of the Holy Family Church. The passion of Jesus Chris was reenacted on April 21 by this bunch of talented young adults.
The play was divided into the various chapters in Jesus life. It started with the birth of Christ portraying Joseph praising God and promising to take care of Mary and the baby Jesus in her arms. Next is the scene of the Last Supper, where Jesus broke the bread and shared it with the disciples.
Guilt filled the hearts of many, especially the actors of the play, during the scene at Gethsemane as the narrator posed questions to the congregation Questions like "Do we have time for Jesus" and "Can we not spend five minutes to be "awake" for Jesus, were echoed throughout the dimly lit church building.

In his application before Madam Justice Lau Bee Lan, Archbishop Datuk Murphy Pakiam contends that the Minister of Internal Security and the Federal Government are wrong in law for not allowing the Bahasa section of HERALD to use the word "Allah."
In his affidavit, Archbishop Pakiam said, "I am advised by my solicitors that I have a legal right to use the word "Allah" in the HERALD (published by him) and this legal right stems from the right to freedom of speech and expression as enshrined in Article 10 of the Federal Constitution and from the right to profess and practise the Christian faith as enshrined in Article 11 of the Federal Constitution which includes and is not limited to propagating the faith amongst the non-English speaking faithful in Malaysia especially the Indonesians and the Arabic-speaking of the Christian faith." By Herald.

A Eucharist Celebration to celebrate the third anniversary of Pope's Benedict XVI's pontificate was held at the Church of the Divine Mercy on April 20.
The 5.30pm Mass was presided over by Archbishop Salvatore Pennacchio, the Apostolic Delegate to Malaysia. Archbishop Murphy Pakiam and Bishop Antony Selvanayagam led the other priests in concelebrating.
Also present among the congregation were ambassadors, members of the Diplomatic Corps and members from the religious congregations.
In his homily, Archbishop Pennacchio drew parallel to the early Christian community and what the Pope exhorts in his Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est. "In the first reading, we see the three important characteristics of a Christian community: Prayer, the service of the word of God and charitable assistance to the needy.
"As Pope Benedict expressed in his encyclical, the Church's deepest nature is expressed in her three-fold responsibility: of proclaiming the word of God (kerygma-mysteria), celebrating the sacraments (leiturgia), and exercising the ministry of charity (diakonia).

Recently Archbishop Murphy Pakiam donated RM159,000 from the Archdiocesan Disaster Fund to the following:
RM40.000 was given to the Embassy of Peru in Kuala Lumpur on Feb 12, 2008 to be forwarded to the victims of the earthquake disaster that hit Peru in August 2007.
On April 8, 2008 Archbishop Pakiam donated RM119,337.15 (USD37,136.19) to Caritas Internationalis for distribution to countries hit by floods in 2007 in Uganda, Africa and Bangladesh, South Asia.
The donation represented the Second Collection at all parish Weekend Masses of the 33rd Sunday on Ordinary Time on November 17 and 18, 2007 in the Archdiocese. These donations were made to express our sentiments of solidarity with the victims of the disasters during their time of suffering and loss of lives.
Archbishop Pakiam thanks all donors for their support.

For the past year, the Church of St Francis of Assisi has embarked on numerous activities to raise RM 6.5 million for the purpose of building a community centre and extending the present church.
In an effort to contribute to this building fund, the youths of the church are organizing a carnival. Dubbed the Freak Out Carnival, the celebration will take place on June 8 this year.
The youths are continuing their mission to raise the Rm100,000, which will take them to many other parishes in the Kuala Lumpur Archdiocese. All the best to them in their mission and May the Lord be with them.