by Melani Manel Perera

Solemn celebrations will mark the 300th anniversary of the death of the country’s only blessed, who is considered the apostle of Sri Lanka. The faithful show great devotion. The sacred wooden cross he left is 300-year-old.

Kurunegala (AsiaNews) – The Jubilee Year for the Blessed Joseph Vaz began on 14 January with a solemn Mass. Celebrations will end on 16 January of next year, marking 300 years since his death. Vaz, considered the apostle to Sri Lanka, was beatified by John Paul II when he visited the island nation in 1995. Now, many people hope that the country’s only blessed can be canonised.

The Mass was celebrated by Mgr Harold Anthony Perera, bishop of Kurunegala, along with Bishop Emeritus Raymond Peiris, Fr Reginold Lucien, who is Tamil, and the vicar general of Kurenala diocese Fr Augustin Marcus Fernando near the shrine dedicated to Vaz in the village of Maha Galgamuwa, where the blessed lived. Chants and readings in Tamil and Sinhala marked the service attended by some 2,000 worshippers.

Mgr Perera said that Vaz was “a perfect example of a believer who came to an unknown land, where the Dutch persecuted the Christians, who had no priests, and where people were helpless.” To that land, “he brought back the light of faith.”

AsiaNews spoke to many faithful who agree with Lucilda Wijesinghe, who said that for them “this is a true pilgrimage. We pray for the Blessed Vaz’s canonisation.”

Vaz was born in 1651 in the Portuguese colony of Goa. He was ordained priest in 1676 and became a member of the Congregation of Saint Philip Neri. He arrived in Sri Lanka in 1687, crisscrossing it far and wide. He lived on the island for the next 24 years until his death in 1711.

During that time, he took part in the translation of the catechism, a summary of the Catholic doctrine as well as litanies devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary into Tamil and Sinhala.

Legend has it that when Tamil residents asked him to protect them from many local wild beasts, serpents and elephants, Vaz donated his wooden cross, which according to tradition still lies in a reliquary aut side his shrine.

Celebrations marking the blessed’s 300th anniversary will take place in various places on the island.

Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith celebrated un 16th January the Jubilee’s beginning at the Church of the Blessed Joseph Vaz in Makola parish, in the diocese of Colombo.

(Nimal I. Perera contributed to the article. Picture by Fr Piyal Janaka).

• sri
• lanka
• vaz
• blessed
• jubilee
• john
• paul
• ii
• catholic
• church