Gianni Nicolì from Maison de Paix – 15 May 2022
The story of participation in Holy Mass the previous Sunday (May 8, 2022)
On Sundays going to mass…in Congo.
A twenty-minute walk from the Maison de Paix Center on a dirt road, let’s call it that, according to local standards, and greeting neighbors and acquaintances left and right busy preparing the festive luku, a manioc flour polenta identical to every other day of the year.
The John Paul II sub-parish welcomes us in all its splendor of bamboo huts and palm frond roofs.
We first greet Ignace, a catechist who is delighted that we remember his name.
Promptly at 8:30, the service begins.
The songs are beautiful, truly beautiful, sweet and sinuous. The choir is particularly in spirit today, except that the loudspeaker, strictly battery-powered in these parts, decides to stop working.
No problem, we proceed impromptu, and the celebrant starts off slowly, slowly, but then he gets excited, raises his voice, and clearly emphasizes, with very expressive gestures, the content he is communicating.
The faithful also burst into laughter and applause. We’re sorry we don’t understand, and this reminds us that we are Mundele, that is, white, but we console ourselves by participating wholeheartedly in some amens, which, as we all know, are international.
The choir is not discouraged, it vigorously resumes with the tam-tam just tuned with fire and water before the mass, and not only does it sing, it also dances with the joy and vitality that always abound in Africa.
Since we are Catholic, we too understand the phases of the Mass and understand that the universal Lord loves to be praised in all the languages of the world.
Beneath this hut of straw and mud, so reminiscent of a nativity scene, we realize that the God of Love in whom we believe has no color, but rather the warmth of faith that makes Him present and alive, because here there is much less that stands between us and Him.
The eyes of all the children, often in the arms or on the shoulders of their older siblings, peer at us curiously.
We smile back, almost as if to apologize for being different and for instilling a little fear in them.
As we walk back, we hear the echo of Psalm 8 accompanying us, this time in Kikongo…
“O Lord our God, how great is your name in all the earth!
