From: rich <richarra@gmail.com>

October 10th ' St. Daniel Comboni
(1831 ' 1881)

In 1549 the idealistic Dominican Friar Luis Cancer de Barbastro landed
near Tampa Bay, Florida, with a small crew, purposely unarmed, in the
belief that the local Indians would welcome peaceful gospellers. But
it didn't work. When he set foot on shore he was promptly murdered =
by
the natives. This heroic tragedy might have been avoided had Friar
Louis better understood the aborigines of Florida.

Missionary leaders in recent centuries have been more careful to
acquaint their missionaries with the languages and the ways of the non-Christians where they were to be sent, and to study and help
develop their civilizations. One such leader was Daniel Comboni,
founder of the Verona Missionary Fathers and the Missionary Sisters of
Verona. He was not only an apostolic man; he was a learned man who
made relevant learning a part of his missiology.

Comboni, a native of Limone, on Lake Garda, Italy, felt a special
calling to preach the Gospel in Africa. Preparing for ordination as a
secular priest, he studied not only theology but languages and
medicine. The first three years after his ordination he spent in
Italy. Then in 1857 he set out for Africa and worked for two years
along the White Nile. Ill health obliged him to go back to Italy, but
there he continued to lay plans for resumption of his work in the Dark Continent.

He would not return alone. In 1867 he established in Verona, Italy,
the Sons of the Sacred Heart, whose members were to devote themselves exclusively to the African mission. At the outset, this society was a
religious institute. In 1885 this became a full-fledged religious
congregation of priests and brothers. Today it bears the name of the
Combonian Missionaries of the Heart of Jesus, or the Verona Fathers.
In 1872 he established the Missionary Sisters of Verona, whose field
of operation was likewise to be in Africa.

The Comboni Fathers started their work in the Sudan. Obliged to leave
there because of a revolution, they eventually returned and branched
out into Uganda, Ethiopia and Mozambique. (In later years they would
come to the Americas: Mexico. Brazil, Ecuador, and in 1940 to the
United States, where their work has been chiefly with Blacks, Indians
and Mexicans.)

Father Comboni had been consecrated bishop to head the Vicariate
Apostolic of Central Africa (1872). This was an immense missionary
diocese embracing the Sudan, Nubia and territories south of Africa'=
s
great lakes. The founder insisted that his missionaries, men and women
alike, be specially trained to understand Black society and the
climatic perils of the mission lands. An intense student of African
cultures, he published much scientific work, particularly on African
geography and ethnology. A =E2=80=9Clanguage genius=E2=80=9D himself, he wa=
s a master
not only of six European tongues, but he also learned Arabic and three
African languages, and compiled a dictionary of the Nubian language.
His institutes, therefore, learned from his rules and example, the
need of fully understanding the mentality of those to whom they
preached. Meanwhile, Bishop Comboni cultivated the friendship of the
African civil authorities, and worked effectively through them to end
the widespread slave trade and its abuses.

He was, then, a pioneer in superior methods of evangelization, working
always to regenerate Africa through Africans. Pope Leo XIII termed his
death =E2=80=9Ca great loss,=E2=80=9D but Pope John Paul II, who beatified = him on
March 17, 1996 and canonized him on October 5, 2003, was already a
witness to the flowering of a genuine African Catholic Church.
'Father Robert


Saint Quote:
O my soul, what are you doing? Are you not aware that God sees you
always? You can never hide yourself from His sight. O Father, have
pity on us because we are blind and in darkness. Drive out the
darkness and give me light. Melt the ice of my self-love and kindle in
me the fire of Your charity.
-- St. Catherine of Siena

Bible Quote:
Fear ye not, neither be ye troubled from that time I have made thee to
hear, and have declared: you are my witnesses. Is there a God besides
me, a maker, whom I have not known? The makers of idols are all of
them nothing, and their best beloved things shall not profit them.
They are their witnesses, that they do not see, nor understand, that
they may be ashamed. Who hath formed a god, and made a graven thing
that is profitable for nothing?=C2 [Isaiah 44:8-10] DRB


<><><><>
Behold Me at Your Feet

Behold me at Your feet, O Jesus of Nazareth, behold the most wretched of creatures, who comes into Your presence humble and penitent! Have mercy on
me, O Lord, according to Your great mercy! I have sinned and my sins are
always before You. Yet my soul belongs to You, for You created it, and
redeemed it with Your Precious Blood.

Ah, grant that Your redeeming work be not in vain! Have pity on me; give me tears of true repentance; pardon me for I am Your child; pardon me as You pardoned the penitent thief; look upon me from Your throne in heaven and
give me Your blessing.

I believe in God, etc.--Amen.


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