WE NEED PROGRESSIVE CHURCH LEADERS IN GOA.

While in Kuwait I was as an unregistered member of a number of Non-Roman Catholic Ministries performing its religions obligations besides also associating with some other Non-Christian organisations so too in Goa after my settling down in Goa I am on the same trend but my I attendance is limited only to a few. My purpose of associating with these Non-Christian organisations and Non-Roman Catholic denominations where up to now nobody imposed his permanency on me, for me it is to gain more knowledge of Non-Christians and Christianity thru different angles and many other aspects of human relationship with other humans and society as a whole. But what I learnt more of these Non-romanCatholic denominations is their power of educating their congregations in Christianity to save your soul and how to develop yourself in this world to lead a good life by maintaining your financial output.  Good that Industrial Revolution came into existence in England somewhere in the mid 1600 followed by the Revolution brought in by Martin Luther’s Protestantism that forced Inacio Loyola to bring about his Counter  Revolution in the birth of Society of Jesus some years later that revolutionized the Roman Catholicism. In fact the birth of Protestantism was the revolt against the nonsense the Roman Catholic Church was committing in the name of Religion by preventing the faithful to be forward looking with dynamism. Inacio Loyola’s counter revolution made the faithful more aggressive to live firmly in this world facing obstacles more bravely.

        During Seventies, Eighties and Nineties, Gulf Goans if they were properly guided and directed by the our Church leaders the economy of Goa would have been in our hands.  When I wrote from Kuwait to one Businessman priest my Plan after the successful establishment from Kuwait of the Gulf Goans Hotels Company Limited owned by the Goan Shareholders from Kuwait and its Hotel Goan Heritage at Calangute and also after financing to the tune of lakhs of rupees for Konkani cause in general and Novem Goem in particular including a fatty donation of so many lakhs of rupees from Kuwait itself alone for the construction of Cancer Hospital and many other activities, I received a negative reply from that Priest. During our last so many years of employment in the Gulf we could have done so much for us, for Goa, for our community and Goans as a whole but there was no direction and guidance for us to invest our earnings properly, our Church leaders went on asking donations only from us and did not help us in starting business ventures even at the level of small scale or in any other way. They used our financial resources for their benefits only. I point out 

here our Church because we are members of this Church and by being our leaders, it has more responsibility towards us than others who also enjoyed the benefit of our earnings in the Gulf. If then our Church leaders came forward to establish a Land Bank from the money of Gulf Goans mainly those who were sending the Church leaders donations from the Gulf, roday a good amount of Goan land would have been in our stock.  Similarly, with their pushing we could have started our own Bank but our Church has failed us because as I said earlier Roman Catholic Church is not forward looking and having no dynamism otherwise Martin Luther a soldier turned Priest would not have initiated the counter revolution.

The surfacing of so many Non-Catholic denominations recently is surfaced like a counter revolution.  A few years back and during my younger days I never heard the existence of such denominations but they erupted like a volcano where they engulfed in its fold heavy number of the followers of Roman Catholicism and if till today Roman Catholicism is surviving still on strong footing then because of the elderly Saintly Persons like St. Fzrancis Xavier and other like him. It was the earlier Saints who put in tremendous efforts to promote Roman Catholicism, they were all Missionaries from Europe while ours could not decimate from our Church the discriminatory practices systematically practiced in our Goa Church with the silent nod of our Church leadership.

On last Sunday I attended the service at Soddiem Siolim of Pastor Domnick whose Ministry has put this Village on World Map with bold capital letters because of services Pastor Domnick conducts there in this village.  He spoke and preached on how and why we Goans (I mean Christians) are backward in doing business? I know even during my younger days there was a fad among Christians to say that “business is not meant for Christians as if it is the work of “Chors” and then it was understood then to be a successful in business you have to be a cheat and  thief and you have to lower your dignity”.  I don’t know why this thought was implanted in our minds by our elders but I am sure our Church and especially our Priests were responsible for spreading this canard into the minds of Christians.

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In my village there was one young boy who purchased a Motorbike Rajdoot along with his one Hindu friend in early sixties, both were dropouts from the School were they were my classmates.  When our Pe. Vigar came in contact with him, Pe. Vigar asked him tauntingly with full of sarcasm appearing on his face giving an impression that poor boy has committed a sacrilege in doing this business, “Kitem re Anton, hem Rostadanchem Business kortai”.  That poor boy Anton was humiliated so much that he felt like committing a suicide but he did nothing of that sort but sold his Motorbike.  But his companion who started this Pilot’s business within a year purchased two more Motorbikes and in 5 years period he purchased a Taxi and within a few more he increased it by one more.  And finally he got a Bus now where Anton was working as Conductor.

Pastor Domnick has called a special meeting in the next week at his Siolim location specially to advice and guide the people how to get into business.  He is very much encouraging his members and followers who are in thousands to develop themselves financially by creating producing growth in your income.   He asked the congregation “if outsiders coming into our Goa and doing business and developing well financially then why cant we?” I strongly support him in this direction and wish him all the best.  We need in Goa at this very critical juncture not only one Pastor Domnick in Soddiem Siolim only but in every village and every Vaddo to educate, to guide and to support us in developing our community members financially.  Lack of finance is the root cause of most of  the sins, if not all.

A.Veronica Fernandes.