Aid to the Church in Need: Bibles for Latin America

Bibles for Latin America

Posted by Project Description on 17/8/2009, 2:38 pm
Board Administrator

Quédate con nosotros, Señor – Stay with us, Lord!

By Reinhard backes

"The joy of being disciples and missionaries can be witnessed especially where we live fraternally side by side". So runs the statement made in the concluding document of the most recent conference of the Bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean. In May 2007 they gathered for their fifth General Assembly in the Brazilian city of Aparecida, in the presence of Pope Benedict XVI, who also participated in the Assembly.
On this occasion the bishops called on all the faithful to become "a Church with open arms, which has the capacity to welcome and approach each individual person in friendship and sincerity". They urged parishes throughout the continent to become the "house and school of community". These were to form basic Church communities, promote associations of the laity, movements and new communities and "proclaim to all the men and women of our continent that through Jesus, the Son of God, the Risen One, who is living among us, we are loved and redeemed".

Many dioceses have responded to the initiative of Aparecida. In Piura, the northernmost diocese of Peru, the call has not gone unheard either. Archbishop José Antonio Eguren Anselmi, aged 53 and bishop here only since 2006, has now turned to the Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) with a request for financial help so that the diocese can print and distribute 5,000 Bibles.

A child receives religious instruction from his parents.

For over 20 years now ACN has been supporting the dissemination of the Sacred Scriptures – and not only in the Americas. In the last couple of decades alone, the Biblia Latinoamericana – the Latin American Bible -- has been funded by ACN to the tune of around 1.5 million copies on this continent. Each year ACN distributes around 75,000 Bibles, at a cost of around four Euros per copy for printing and transport.
Archbishop Eguren has in fact already received the Bibles he requested and has sent them out to some 50 parishes and 100 missionaries in his diocese. In this region, where the population has been growing for years, the response has been huge. The bishop has received numerous letters from ordinary parishioners and catechists with comments such as this one from 19-year-old Augusto Ordinola of the parish of Nuestra Senora de Transito (the Assumption) in the Castilla suburb of Piura, who writes, "I meditate on the words of Jesus daily, so that I can pass them on to my brothers and sisters". He continues, "Many people do not know them at all. And so we are instruments of God’s work. His message helps us to change our lives and make them better, both within the family and in our wider environment".
And 18-year-old Laura Jurado Santos, of the parish of St Michael the Archangel, Piura's cathedral parish since the year 1588, writes, "I generally read the Bible passages of the day; not every day, but regularly. The Bible helps me to trust in God, never to give up hope and daily to strive to do his will. The Bible is like a priceless weapon. I always use it for mission. Thank you, ACN".
Letters like these show that the goal of re-evangelising the entire continent is one that many Catholics have embraced. The motto chosen for this campaign at the general assembly of the bishops, Quédate con nosotros, Señor (Stay with us, Lord), crops up again and again in their letters. Whether young or elderly, most of these missionaries are simply ordinary Catholic faithful and lay people who wish to profess their Faith, when asked to give an account of the hope that is in them.
The concluding document of Aparecida puts it nicely: "Jesus invites all of us to take part in his mission. No one should stand aside with arms folded! Being a missionary means proclaiming the Kingdom of God with creativity and courage, wherever the Gospel has not sufficiently been made known or embraced, and especially in difficult or neglected regions and beyond our own borders."

To help this cause please contact the Australian office of ACN on (02) 9679-1929. e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org or write to Aid to the Church in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148. Web: www.aidtochurch.org

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Aid to the Church in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148 ABN: 62 418 911 594
Ph/Fax (02) 9679-1929 e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org web: www.aidtochurch.org