A work of Biblical proportions

• Dino Mazzoli is an Italian artist living in England

• He has undertaken a work of Biblical Proportions!
• The House-bound artist copied by hand the entire Christian Community Bible
• made over 5000 color illustrations of scenes from the bible 
• Years of work - finally completed
• He hopes to make his work appear online soon

On June 26, Dino wrote to Fr. Alberto. Excerpts: 

…I have the feeling that my Bible will be well received.. I frequently look at work done and admire at myself to how I have been able to finish this immense work... My 80 years I could not write one new page.. Someone must have prayed a lot for me!

My dream is to see this bible published in a BOOK, or better, in many volumes as it has 1500 pages of large size with 5000 color illustrations, all handmade. No one has done such a thing before. (Please do not misunderstand me ... I do not mean to boast of Mazzoli Dino ... I'm just a sinner). II have more than 15,000 works of art that I don't want to exhibit or sell. 

I will not receive a penny when this work is published. All services will go to charity.

Fr. Alberto, hope you can read this letter. Given my current condition,  Usually I spend 20 hours in bed and the other 4 I fight to be seated... but I'm going to watch the World Cup football matches...!!

I ask you to pray for my family and ask for your blessing.

Celebrating the Word of God

Preaching the Gospel through varied means is our mission and Claretian Publications in Macau has been engaging the media, both traditional and new, in its evangelising mission. 

This is the Chinese Blog : 與聖言同行

During the past couple of months, we have introduced a new blog in three languages to share the exegesis and reflections on the Sunday Liturgy. 

Our English Blog: Celebrating the Word of God

The reflections are by Fr. Fernando Armellini, an Italian Missionary and Biblical scholar. With his permission, the original Italian text is translated into English, Chinese and Spanish. 

The Blog in Spanish: Celebración de la Palabra

Youth Ministry

Youth Ministry gets a special emphasis in the Church's focus on Evangelization in the modern world. Fr. Jose has been working with the Diocesan Youth Commission for the past three years. The Commission organizes regular training programme, prayer gatherings, pilgrimages sports events etc. in schools, universities and parishes in Hong Kong. The video is a few visuals from the annual sports meet conducted by the Diocesan English Youth.

 

PS: If you do not have the answer to the puzzle yet, 

imagine the picture rotated 180 degrees and have a look at it again !!

Welcome to the China Bulletin - June 2014

The Church in China holds over 22,000 baptisms on Easter

During the Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday over 22,000 Chinese have been baptized, in the mainland China. Hebei Province, home to most of the Catholics in China, has registered more baptisms.

In the Diocese of Hong Kong over 3000 adults have been baptized during the Easter Vigil 

Jubilee Year of Religious Profession

Alberto with Jijo 

Fr. Jijo Kandamkulathy is in his Silever Jubilee year of the Religious profession. He made his religious profession on 31 May 1990, in the Claretian Novitiate in Bangalore, India. We thank God for the gift of Jijo to the community and wish him abundance of blessings from the heavens, lots of cheers and good health in this year of grace in the years to come!

Indian Pilgrimage...

Fr. Jojo lead a group of faithful on a 10 days pilgrimage to India in the first week of May 2014. Fr. Jojo writes: 

"A Pilgrimage is a journey trusting in the providence of God and going to the places wherever He leads". Well, this is what I told the people who asked for the itinerary and detailed plan of our trip. And the definition that I gave was to escape from the duties that I was suppose to do. These words of mine created lot of tension and fears among the people even though they did not express it explicitly. 

However we felt God's providence throughout our journey and strengthened our faith and trust in God. We visited churches, temples, families, homes for orphans etc. In short, we entered wherever people welcomed us. 

We were also blessed to meet many important church leaders from India like Cardinals, Bishops, Nuncio etc.......and all these without any appointment. 

And we felt that Church is a big Family. Even though many were not able to talk the language every one understood the language of LOVE which made our trip an enriching experience. 

The local Newspaper picked up the story of the Chinese group visiting the country! 

From the Editor's Desk:

We have been talking about it for long! And finally when the project gets to its completion, there is an air of joy, accomplishment, satisfaction and of course anticipation and anxieties... The publishing of the new revised Chinese Bible arouses a mixture of all these emotions! Finally we are at it! 

This is the cover of the Chinese New Testament that is expected by the end of June. The text is in traditional (old) characters, for the South China, Macau, Hong Kong and Taiwan region. 

'Sharing the Joy of the Gospel in China' 

Our mission is to help China build 'bridges', no 'walls'. This book is a step towards this direction. Written by a Chinese teacher presents the history, challenges and potential prospects for evangelization in China. The book will also be released in Chinese in the near future.

Bible Diary 2015 and Daily Gospel 2015 

The Final touches on the Spanish Bible Diary 2015 and Chinese Daily Gospel 2015 are underway. This year we introduced a new concept for the Spanish version of the Bible Diary. Alberto spent a few weeks in Mexico working with the team and finally it is into print: 87,500 copies with for more than 20 destinations across the glob! Here we have the cover: 

Ensure your copies today! You can also order for other books from Claretian Publications by visiting us here: http://bibleclaret.org/ 

Did you remember to pray?!

Pope Francis has warned couples not to substitute cats and dogs for children, saying it will only lead to solitude and the 'bitterness of loneliness' in old age. 
But there are things we must learn from these dogs!

It's all part of training! Not just the dogs, do not forget to train ourselves too! 

Ancient Chinese Wisdom!

Each of us has our own unique flaws. 

We're all cracked pots. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have

 that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding. 

There's a lot of good out there.

Welcome to the China Bulletin - May 2014

 China set to be 'world's most Christian country' by 2030
The number of Christians in Communist China is growing so steadily that by 2030 it could have more churchgoers than America, reports The Telegraph. The People's Republic of China remains, at least officially, an atheist country. But the number of Protestant Christians in China has grown from one million in 1949 to more than 49 million in 2010. Experts believe that number could more than triple over the next generation:

Prof Yang, a leading expert on religion in China, believes that number will swell to around 160 million by 2025. That would likely put China ahead even of the United States, which had around 159 million Protestants in 2010 but whose congregations are in decline.

By 2030, China's total Christian population, including Catholics, would exceed 247 million, placing it above Mexico, Brazil and the United States as the largest Christian congregation in the world, he predicted.  In his book The Rise of Christianity, sociologist Rodney Stark estimates that during the first 350 years of Christianity, the religion grew at a rate of 40 percent per decade. During the 61 year period from 1949 to 2010, Christianity grew at a rate of 89% per decade.

Part of the reason for the exponential growth is attributable to the sheer size of the population of China. With 1.351 billion people in the country, Christians comprise only 5 percent of the country. If current trends hold, in 2030 Christians in China will make up almost 9 percent of the total population. While the ratio of Christians to population would still be small, the total numbers are astounding. By mid-century, China may have more citizens who identify as Christians than the United States has citizens.