SYCC HOSTS THE FELLOWSHIP of MALAYSIAN COVENANT COMMUNITIES (FMCC) ~ DAY 2

Article by Susanna Cordova

and photos by Helen John

Sandakan : On the second day, 2nd May, our guest speaker, Rev. Fr. Thomas Makajil, the rector of St Mary's Cathedral facilitated the talk on “Responding to the Challenges the church is facing today.” He emphasized on the importance of each respective group of the community to really understand the history of the early church in order to strengthen their faith and move forward as authentic Catholics. 

He also mentioned that the current challenges we faced actually happened in the early church as mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, where the Roman Empire was not in favour with the Christians with many of the believers being persecuted. 

Indeed, during that era there were a lot of issues confronting the Christian community. The community in Jerusalem responded to these issues with great faith. They went about evangelizing the faith without fear. He said, we too, should not be afraid like in the Acts of the Apostles where they evangelized fervently and at every opportunity as Jesus said, “I will be with you until the end of the time.”

On the same day, each respective community was given a slot to share on the development of their community; the reality, the challenges and their hope. Indeed it was an amazing sharing to learn how they shared their love and faith through actions, as in James 2: 17, 'So it is with faith: if it is alone and includes no actions, then it is dead.”

In the late afternoon, there were small group discussions for the men and ladies' groupings about their role in the family and community. The FMCC Youths also had their general meeting chaired by the FMCC chairman, Bro. Anthony Lim earlier in the morning. 

Fr Sunny Chung leading the Opening Prayer 

for the Praise and Worship Concert

While, in the evening, after the Sunset mass, there was a grand Praise and Worship Concert at the Parish Hall, staged by the FMCC Youths. It received an overwhelming response from all the youths of the various communities in the Cathedral Parish.