A Wonderful Christmas

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. And He will be our Ruler. Isaiah 9 : 6

December 24th 2006 was a Sunday, so the Christmas tree and the crib was put up the previous day. Gifts were arranged under the tree for the children. The Crib was set up and kept hidden from view, until the mass commenced. The alter was decorated with beautiful flowers. We made the shed look as beautiful as we could.

Soon after Sunday mass the curtains went up, and the children got into their costumes, many of the adults stayed back to watch the tableau. Everything went off very well. As a tribute to the cast I wish to mention all their names here. Niveda, Anita, Aishwarya, Richi, Sally, Chris, Jeshilya, Abhilash, Risho, Johnny , Andrew, Priyanka, Roger, Abinaya, and Genanie. The people applauded the whole cast and everybody kept saying it was the best play they had ever seen. After that Santa distributed gifts to each and every child, the children enjoyed each and every moment of the day. Father Antony received his surprise gift, it was a huge greeting with the signatures of all the children.

Church Friends...

That same night we had Christmas Mass at 10pm. We had an unexpectedly large crowd, there was hardly any place to accomodate everybody. Baby Jesus was placed in the crib during the mass and the crib was blessed. It was our first Christmas and we were all very happy. After mass everybody was served cake and coffee.... nobody felt like going home.

The crib in church........

New year eve we had an adoration service and the new year 2007 was welcomed with a morning mass. Ours was a model parish, just as the bishop wanted, but unfortunately this didn't last long.

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

My servants shall sing for joy. Isaiah 65 : 14

Then came November and we began preparing for Christmas. Our shed had to be decorated. We didn’t want to spend too much on decoration so we decided to make them ourselves. Under the guidance of Mrs. Aloysius we learnt to make flowers, bouquets, wreaths etc. Each of us did our own share of the decorations at home, we brought out all our creative abilities and made many beautiful things. We amazed ourselves, they were even more beautiful than the ones sold in shops. We were proud of our work, here are some pictures of them.

The wreath was hand made.....

So were these stars, candles, christmas cards and wreaths.....
We managed to give our little church a christmas-y look.....

We planed to have a small Christmas celebration in church after the Sunday Mass on 24.12.2006. It was decided to put on a small play by little children depicting the nativity scene. For this a few catechism children were selected and the practice began. Roles were alloted to the kids and the practice sessions were filled with fun and laughter. The five boys selected to be shepherds had a nice time torturing Joseph and Mary, they used to run away with Baby Jesus and beat their little lambs. They were a restless bunch, they used to throw mud on the angels and when the angels complained, these shepherd boys would say, "Instead of complaining, why don't you fly away with your wings". They were a naughty lot, but at the end, they performed beautifully.

Here are the kids who tested our patience and but made the whole ordeal pleasantly memorable.

Around December 15th, we began caroling, we enjoyed going from house to house celebrating the birth of Christ and spreading Christmas joy.

Caroling, it was great walking around in our colony.... singing and celebrating the miracle of CHRISTMAS......

THE BIBLE

Turn to me now and be saved, people all over the world. Isaiah 45 : 22

Father's sermons were fabulous, he prepared diligently before each mass and told us about siants, people in the bible and the historical significances evident in the Holy Book. He made us think without forcing us to follow inane ideologies. He opened up our minds and enabled us to perceive the events with a historical view (by keeping in mind the times and traditions of an olden era), thus enlightening us on many obscure references in the Bible. Many of us started jotting down the refrences and looking it up later on. Fr. Antony even took the trouble to print leaflets showing the references the Bible makes to certain events and distribute them to the people. For some of us the bible became an everyday part of our lives.

Every parish should have a cemetery, obviously, and so the parish members started looking out for a suitable piece of land. The female members were given the task of finding out how many people wanted to join the parish of Infant Jesus Church. Rs. 3000 was the joining fee which is mandatory in almost all churches. The membership could only be confirmed if the people received a letter ascertaining that their previous parish priest had no objection. The men met with many philanthropist's and collected a tidy sum. Due to our had work and zealous labour, a plot of land was finally procured at Vattakarai. Some work was done on the land to level it off, after that we had the Blessing of the cemetery. Till date two people who had led a long and confortable life, have been laid to rest there.

The First Adoration

For though the LORD is exalted, Yet He regards the lowly. Psalm 138:6

This is the current agenda of our small parish

Every Sunday : Holy Mass at 7.30 am
Baptism : First Sunday of every month after mass
Novena : To Infant Jesus , every Thursday along with mass.
Adoration : Every first Thursday after mass and novena

We started catechism classes after Sunday mass, we have around seventy children and some dedicated teachers.The first Adoratoin brought tears to my eyes. I have always seen our Lord being praised and worshiped in big posh churches but never in a poor shed. I was wonderstruck ..... my Lord! The King of Kings! In our shed? In our humble land? I humbly thanked Him for His love and mercy. After that every adoration brings tears to my eyes.

As the church activities progressed and as the people and children became more involved, small changes were soon evident in every household. Pop songs were replaced by hymns in most of our houses, friendships were formed, people were happy to just be part of the church. Things were going smoothly, it was one big happy family.

P.S: I wanted to open a site for Infant Jesus Church but Karen says opening a blog is easier and that's how this one came into being.

A new priest and a new shed.

Isaiah 49:5 My God shall be my strength

We celebrated Palm Sunday with a procession and Fr. Stephen Henry handled the service. Easter morning mass was celebrated great joy and beautiful songs. On 9th June 2006, St Joseph`s Church, Vattakarai became an independent parish with a new parish priest: Fr. Antony. Infant Jesus church became a substation to St. Joseph's Church and Fr. Antony took charge and got everything into order. As soon as he arrived, he called a meeting of all who were interested in the development of the church. It was decided to demolish the old foundation as it did not adhere to the construction norms. A committee member offered his piece of land in the colony to build a temporary shed until the main church was constructed. A sturdy and comfortable shed soon came into being and the first mass in this new place was held on the 1st Sunday of August, 2006. Huge loads of clean beach sand was dumped onto the ground and a few chairs were provided for the elders. August 15th was celebrated with a mass and the Flag hoisting ceremony. Very soon we became a proper parish and meetings were held regularly and people started coming regularly to church.

Here are a few pictures.....

Here's the temporary shed, a place filled with beautiful memories.

The altar

Feast of the Assumption of Our Lady

Hoisting of the Flag

OUR FIRST MIRACLE

In those days we just informed a few ladies who we knew would be interested in joining a choir, that is how we got to know Maggie. She has leadership qualities and she soon got the choir in order, they kept improving with every song. It was not an easy job, every Sunday after Mass the chairs and the heavy alter table had to be hauled over the compound wall to the neighbouring land where it would be safe. The mike, speakers, amplifiers etc. had to be carried upstairs to the neighbouring house, the other mass articles had to be packed in a bag. The tent had to be dismantled (we couldn't leave the tent up due to the strong winds). Every Saturday evening everything had to be set up again. People willingly pitched in to help set up the tents and take it down again after every mass. Then the Lenten season arrived along with the monsoon season in full swing, this was when we witnessed the first miracle. Not once did it rain during the mass or during the Stations of the Cross . It used to rain just before or after the service but never during mass. We were all grateful to the Lord for His mercies.

THE FIRST MASS

We were to have mass every Sunday and it was decided to hold the first mass on February 5th 2006. We were all very exicited. We went to Assisi church and bought a few things required for Mass. Everybody was given some work to do. Shamiana , chairs, sound system and a few other necessities were hired. Manohari had to prepare the prayer of the faithfull, everybody had to be informed , etc.etc. Finally the day arrived, and a few ladies were selected to sing in the choir accompained by Merwin on the casio. Merwin played beautifully and everything went off well. Everybody was happy.... it was like a cherished dream coming true for Jessy and me. Slowly things started going on routinely, people began to donate chairs, mike, speakers etc.. We no longer required the shamiana. Every Saturday evening the men put up the tents, while the choir practiced in the evening breeze. On the last Sunday of February we started singing one English song in mass, sometimes during Holy Communion and other times the closing hymn. The girls became interested in the choir and they were eager to learn new songs and perform well. They started downloading, preparing copies and practicing over and over to make the song sound perfect. Ashiwini took over playing the Casio as Merwin was in the 12th. The number of people attending mass began to increase.

Here are a few pictures of the first mass....

IN THE BEGINNING

The concept of building an Infant Jesus church in Ponnapa Nadar Colony, (Nagercoil, Kanyakumari District, India) started about 10 years back. A few like minded people formed a group and had their first meeting at Servite Convent. A committee was formed, Mr Soosai was unanimously chosen as the president and Mr Panipichai as the secretary. Under the direction of Fr. Yesu Rathnam who was then the parish priest of Holy Family Church, the committee planned to procure a piece of land. The idea was presented to the Bishop and the request for a new parish was met favourably. The President was the first to say that he would donate
Rs. 50,000 after that everybody pitched in and the committee started raising funds. They began going for collection and everybody in the colony were rather interested at the idea of having a church close by. Mr.Athanas had some land in Carmel Mount Street, he offered to sell it, so the committee bought his share of the land and the land adjoining it. They finally had about twenty cents of land in the church's name.

Next step was getting the approval from the government officials, which took us about ten years. It was only due to the untiring perseverance of the secretary that we received the offical green signal. Meanwhile in our eagerness to have a church we started the foundation work which was blessed by Fr. Amalraj Nevis. Some priests came from the bishop house, a parish council was formed and handed over to Fr. Ladislause , parish priest of St Antony's church. The INFANT JESUS CHURCH became a sub- station. We were all exhilarated.