Pakistan: Lent initiatives for the poor, prisoners and the disabled (video)
Trees near parish buildings have become food collection points for the poor. In Faisalabad free courses are offered to students who have dropped out of school. Spiritual pilgrimages are organised in homes for the disabled run by nuns.
Lahore (AsiaNews) – The Catholic Church is marking Lent with a number of charity works in favour of the poor, the sick, the mentally and physically disabled, and prisoners, thus renewing its service in favour of the downtrodden of society.
Like every year, in the Catholic area of Akbarabad in Faisalabad, the faithful leave bags with groceries under a tree near the Church.
"The dead tree has become our collection point,” Fr Kamran Taj, vicar general of the diocese, told AsiaNews. “Our catechist stores them inside the church. During Holy Week we provide the food to 20 poor families and widows" thanks to the donations.
The clergyman also organises free courses for 15 school dropouts at St. Gerard Church in the Saeed Abad area. "The two-hour classes are meant to support the poor families in the area, most of them sanitation workers," he explained.
The tradition of using a tree as a collection point for donations during Lent is observed in many of the 129 parishes in the majority Muslim country.
During Lent, churches host seminars, radio programmes, and daily readings as well as encourage charity drives to raise awareness of the meaning of the 40 days of fasting.
Last Sunday, Fr Inayat Bernard invited the sisters who run the "Home of Love" and the Dar ul-Karishma hospice to Lahore’s Cathedral of the Sacred Heart.
The Missionaries of Charity, the order founded by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and the nuns of the Charity of St Jeanne Antide Thouret spoke about their work serving the mentally and physically disabled. At the end of the Mass, the parishioners gave them food and other items.
The rector of the cathedral noted that "every year during Lent, the parish usually finances ‘charity trips’, i.e. spiritual pilgrimages. “This edition only 60 people visited the less fortunate.
For him, “It is important that people visit these centres. We want more and more people to understand the difficult work of the sisters."
Every Friday the clergyman in his homily also presents the biblical characters of the crucifixion of Christ. "Our faithful claim that they read the Bible every day, but they usually have no idea who these people are.
“Before the nationalisation of Church-run schools in 1972, catechism was compulsory. Today, however, it is hardly considered an important subject and is usually taught in the last years of school."
In the run-up to Easter, Caritas Pakistan Lahore (CPL) also helps prisoners, the disabled and others who can benefit from its skill development programmes.
Some “50,000 money boxes and 20,000 envelopes have been sent around the eastern archdiocese,” said Naeem Naz, head of CPL human resources management. “As always, we also translated the pope’s message for Lent into Urdu and sent it to the 26 parishes."
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