Before the end of the year, two priests and three nuns from Italy, India and Myanmar will give life to a new presence in the diocese of Tanjung Selor, in Borneo, conceived together with the religious congregations born in the world inspired by the charism of this missionary institute. Superior General Brambillasca: “A project to renew in everyone the desire to go on a mission.”
The PIME missionaries are preparing to go to Indonesia, a large Asian nation where they have never been present until now. But they will not arrive there alone: the one that should be born at the end of the year in the diocese of Tanjung Selor, on the island of Borneo, will in fact be the first missionary fruit of the common journey of the Bounded Missionary Families (Bmf), the organization that for some years has brought together the various local congregations of men and women born throughout the world from the charism of the Institute.
The announcement of the new initiative was made by the Superior General, Father Ferruccio Brambillasca, in a letter sent to all the confreres on Easter Sunday. For PIME, Indonesia – which with its nearly 280 million inhabitants is the fourth most populous country in the world and also the one with the largest number of Muslims – will become the twentieth nation in which its missionaries are present. And Borneo, in particular, is today a very significant area: on the large island that also includes Malaysia and the Sultanate of Brunei, Indonesia is in fact building its new capital, Nusantara, which will be officially inaugurated next August.
In total, around fifteen ecclesial realities from China, Myanmar, Italy, the Philippines, Brazil, India and Bangladesh are part of the LMF. Their journey was born from a common intuition of the General Directorates of the PIME and the Missionaries of the Immaculate Conception, which resulted in a first meeting of mutual knowledge, held in 2019 in Hyderabad. But it was three years later – at a second meeting held again in India, at the house of the Catechist Sisters of St. Anne, founded in 1914 by Father Silvio Pasquali – that the idea of creating a shared missionary presence arose from this meeting.
“Criteria were already identified then – writes Father Brambillasca in the letter – for the choice of a mission site: that it should be ‘new’ for each of the realities of the Bmf, where none of us would be present; that it should still be a ‘relatively known’ and typically missionary area, devoid of the presence of other institutes; that an initial team for this common project should be inter-congregational, made up of at least five people made available by our institutes, congregations and organizations.”
After initially considering other possibilities, the choice fell on the Indonesian diocese of Tanjung Selor, located in the region of North Kalimantan. “Bishop Paulinus Yan Olla,” writes Father Brambillasca, “asked to be present at a service in the area of Apo Kayan and Pulau Sapi, a remote area of his diocese, which can only be reached once a week by light aircraft. The bishop clearly presented the priorities of the missionary area that he would like to entrust to the Bmf missionaries: the creation of a Christian community, the development and strengthening of the condition of women and children, the education of young people, care for migrants, ecumenical dialogue and dialogue with Islam.”
Following this request, two PIME missionaries – Father Xavier Lourdh, from the general direction, and Father John Berchman – visited the diocese of Tanjung Selor in October 2022. They were thus able to learn about the context of a Church in which Christians make up about 11% of the population, but which can only count on 17 priests in a very vast territory with many small communities. Catholics are mostly migrants from other parts of Indonesia, who work day after day in the forests for the production of palm oil: their situation seems very vulnerable and they are often subject to exploitation.
Next December, five missionaries will leave for Indonesia. This first team of people from different nations and congregations will be led by a member of the general management of PIME, who has long missionary experience in Thailand and India. With him will be another young Indian missionary from PIME, an Indian nun from the Missionaries of the Immaculate Conception, and two other religious from Myanmar (one from the Sisters of Reparation, a congregation founded in Italy by Father Carlo Salerio, one of the missionaries who returned from the first ill-fated mission in Melanesia in the mid-19th century, and one from the Burmese congregation of the Zetaman Sisters of the Little Flower, founded in 1961 in the diocese of Taunggyi on the initiative of the then bishop, Monsignor John Baptist Gobbato). In the coming months, these five missionaries will devote themselves to getting to know each other and preparing their departure.
Father Brambillasca comments: “Indonesia is a fascinating missionary project: it is ad gentes, it is in accordance with our charism – which throughout history has given rise to other institutes, congregations and organisations – and above all it responds to the needs of a local Church that asks for help in the field of evangelisation. There is no lack of challenges and difficulties, also of a material nature. And it is an inter-congregational project – not just of the PIME – in which we work together, according to a synodal style, the true challenge and at the same time the true need for the Church today.”
“I entrust this new project to each one of you and to your prayers,” concluded the Superior General of PIME. “In addition to being a project that responds to the particular needs of a Church that continues to need missionaries, it is a project that I hope will contribute to rekindling the desire to go on a mission, to proclaim the Word where it has not yet been proclaimed.”
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