Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru

Bengaluru, Aug 6: The Suvartha Konkani Bible Marathon that was started at 9 am on July 26 was concluded at 5.15 am July 31, 2021. It was a feast of continuous 116 hours of the Word of God online in Konkanni. The entire was proclaimed at a stretch which gave a unique experience to proclaimers and viewers that has shaken their being as shared by many of them.

The Bible Commission of the archdiocese of Bangalore and the Federation of Konkanni Catholic Associations (FKCA) had jointly organized the Suvartha Konkani Marathon, a proclamation of the entire Bible. 49 proclaimers took turn at every half an hour to proclaim the Word of God. They were assisted technically by a team of 13 admins. All felt that there was the hand of God throughout the proclamation as everything went on smoothly.

In order to celebrate the bond created by the proclamation of the Word of God and to share the experiences with the Word of God, a gathering of all the proclaimers, with their admins, the WhatsApp assistants along with committee members was organized on August 1, 2021 at the Paalana Bhavana, the Pastoral Centre of the archdiocese of Bangalore. The archbishop Peter Machado celebrated the Holy Eucharist and presided over the short programme followed. Fr Faustine L Lobo preached a meaningful homily on the Word of God. Fr George v Lobo also was the concelebrant.

The admins, the proclaimers were invited to share their testimony on the Word of God. Six members came forward and gave heart warming witness to the gifts they received from the Lord during the proclamation. The archbishop gave away a memento each to all the committee members and the council members of the FKCA.

In his message the archbishop invited the participants to fall in love with Jesus and not in the proclaimers, who are the messengers. He gave a few suggestions to them to follow as a follow up of the marathon. He invited, “We should now get into a personal marathon where everyone has to read a chapter each from the Bible every day; a family marathon – Motivating the family members to read the Bible one after another; a Bible Learning – group discussion among the Bible readers and Bible correspondence course – To join the Bible correspondence course conducted by the CCBI Commission for Bible that we should start thinking about the Bible. Quoting Mother Theresa, he said that thinking becomes word, words become habit, habits become character and character becomes our life. Our life should be based on the Bible.

Also on this occasion FKCA presented three sanitizer stands to the archbishops house Bangalore.

Fr George V Lobo too was present and prayed for the success of the programme. While FKCA President Silvian Noronha warmly welcomed the gathering Nigel Fernandes, the joint secretary of the Bible Commission of the archdiocese proposed the vote of thanks to were instrumental to make the marathon fruitful. Kiran D’Souza, one of the admins, compered the programme.