Nathalie Marytsch explains how the Centenary Pilgrim Altar Cloth gives expression to the Columban story of mission from its beginning in China in 1918 to the present day.
In 2018, the Missionary Society of St Columban will be celebrating 100 years of mission. At a ceremony last October in the Philippines, Superior General, Fr Kevin O’Neill, announced that 29 June 2018 has been designated Foundation Day and will therefore be “a special celebration” for the Columban family.
The Columban story over the past 100 years is all about living the Gospel message through the lives of people and places. The Centenary Pilgrim Altar Cloth gives expression to this story of mission. The Irish linen cloth comprises 14 sections. Each section is embroidered with the name of a country where Columbans presently work.
The young Columban priests and Lay Missionaries, representing all our mission areas, who gathered in Tagatay last October, were each given a section of the cloth during a ‘handing-over ceremony’. During the ceremony we remembered the pilgrims and missionaries who followed in the footsteps of Jesus, the numerous Columbans who answered God’s call and left an imprint on where they lived and worked.
We brought our section of the cloth back to our places of mission with the task of inviting other Columbans, family members, friends, benefactors and supporters and all who are involved in Columban mission to write their names on the cloth.
All the names added to the cloth shape Columban mission today: a mission of peoples and places moulded in the love of God and experienced in the cultures and situations where Columbans live and find God. As these sections of the Centenary Pilgrim Altar Cloth found their way into communities, parishes and places where we engage in mission, they symbolised a journey: a journey that celebrates our love for Christ expressed in our commitment to work for justice for all, our open-door welcome for migrants, our dialogue with other faiths and our solidarity with the poor and our call to live among those on the margins of society.
The 14 sections of the cloth will form a single altar cloth which will be used for Eucharistic celebrations throughout 2018 when the Centenary Pilgrim Altar cloth will unite all of us across the Columban world “to give thanks for what has been, with passion celebrate mission today and with hope to look forward to our unfolding participation in God’s mission into the next 100 years and beyond”, as Fr Kevin O’Neill said last October in Tagatay.
The writing of names on the cloth has happened in countries as distant from each as China and Chile, Myanmar and the Fiji Islands. It is indicative of the multicultural nature of the Columban family, which will be symbolically present in every Eucharist and thanksgiving ceremony throughout the Centenary year. It officially begins on 23 November 2017 and continues until 23 November 2018 and has as its theme ‘Sharing Gospel Joy’.