Our journey as a community in SS2 began in 1981 when Father Peter Kim SJ was the parish priest of SFX. Perhaps the passing of Father Peter in September 2016 rekindled commitment among members to rejuvenate our BEC. Some members shared that Fr Peter gave us the gift of not only our BEC but also friendship with one another. We have experienced how good it can be and by the grace of God we can grow to become disciples of hope and joy to the larger community.
There was a lot we did as a community in the last few months of 2016. But let me share some of what we’ve been doing more recently.
On Wednesday 18 January 2017, we gathered for reflection and prayer on the theme: “Hope: God’s Gift for the Kingdom”. We then shared about the Cross of Discipleship (Mt 16:24) based on the handout with a series of pictures. We were fascinated with the little figures carrying their crosses and the sharing was animated. We can embrace our daily crosses better if we see that others have much heavier crosses to bear. The little figure whittling his cross along the journey until he was not able to cross a chasm while others were able to represents avoiding moving out of our comfort zones to be more active in the BEC. The burden of discipleship need not be borne alone as we could carry the cross together in reaching out and ministering to the needy within the BEC and the larger community.
On Sunday 12 February 2017, we ushered in the Year of the Fire Rooster together. We began with the hymn “Morning Has Broken” to remind ourselves of the good old days when the rooster in the backyard used to wake us up in the morning. This was followed by a short description of the personality traits of five types of roosters – wood, fire, earth, gold and water. We then looked at the presentation: “The Catholic Blessing of ‘Tossing Yu Sheng’ by Father Alex”.
The oil that is added to the mixture of vegetables, fish and crackers “reminds us that we have been baptized and confirmed with the sacred Oil of Chrism, so that we will always carry out our role as priest, prophet and king – our sacred duties which we share with Christ the Anointed One.” The food for our spirits was followed by potluck fellowship.
On Sunday afternoon 26 March 2017, we had a reflection and gathering with the theme: “Hope: Welcoming God’s Gift in Humanity”. We were touched by Nick Vujicic’s message that life is a gift to us: “I know for certain that God does not make mistakes but he does make miracles. I am one of them. You are too.”
We watched him speak in the video “Love Without Limits”. His faith in overcoming obstacles in life is inspiring and he says that there is always something each of us can do to help someone and to make the world around us a little better.
