Br Paul Noonan Formation Centre, Tamale: 22 on 22 and 31 on 31!!

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

22 on 22 and 31 on 31!!

The month of May stands out significant in the novitiate community as two brothers’ celebrated extraordinary birthdays Likisi turned 22 on 22nd and Peter Kabia 31 on 31st.
We joined Kabia’s birthday with the Pentecost eve feast! He was ever grateful to the community and thanked the congregation for every opportunity and his being in Tamale.
Likisi had this to pronounce: “My experience of cold season, after April in Zambia, reminds me that the celebration of my birthday is around the corner. However, on 22nd May, 2009 I woke up in Ghana. I got out of my room, in preparation for my ministry. No sooner had I got out than the chief monk (Br Henry) wished me happy birthday. The wishes I acquired from the community members made me feel almost no difference between the Ghana and Zambia experience I felt at home.

I am privileged to celebrate my birthday abroad with you brothers. I received a handful of gifts and messages in and out side the formation house, wishing long life, though in actual sense my days to the grave are getting closer.
At the big feast which started around 8:30pm, all the community members joined in celebrating my life which was a symbol of my family and that encouraged me to attempt a bottle of Guinness!!! However, what I treasured most on that party was the following; the arrival of Br. Frank Keane from Zambia who has become part of the community up to September as well as the farewell to

Br. Vivek who left for his trip to America, but will be back soon. Not forgetting the four piglets which were delivered that day. Ah, the above mentioned events and my 22nd birthday were colorfully celebrated that night. I thank the community for the support and the encouragements I received”.

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What do we want this novitiate to be?

There is a saying that goes something like this: “If we don’t do what we believe in, then we’ll end up believing in what we do”. Without a vision that is authentic and alive to guide our actions, then we can settle for rationalizing the status quo or what is convenient and comfortable.
One of the first things the new team in Tamale did was to spend time beginning to articulate its vision of a novitiate beyond the basics laid down in our Constitutions. Here are some elements of what we came up with:
Novitiate is a journey, a process that involves KNOWING, EXPERIENCING and CHOOSING.
It is an INITIATION into Christian Brother religious life, so a “rite of passage” into a new identity, a time of learning and testing.
Novitiate confronts the novices with the Brother’s vocation as a call to brotherly solidarity and community, not to privilege, status and security.
It involves exploration of the basic values of faith and vocation, and the challenge to embrace these out of personal conviction and free choice.
Novitiate means understanding that a religious vocation makes a claim on the whole of the person and his life, including his inner life, his relationships and his professional activity (ministry). Furthermore, it challenges the novice to see the dynamic inter-relationship of these areas and to learn what their integration means.
Novitiate is a time of DISCERNMENT. The novice learns more deeply who he is, and what this Christian Brother life is. There is a constant back-and-forth movement between these two poles as an answer is sought to the question, “Is this where I am meant to be? Is this the life that will enable me to find my true self in God?”