Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Bogota (Agenzia Fides) - The Redemptorist Missionaries of Colombia held a celebration in recent days to recall the three Italian missionaries who arrived in 1859 to the then Republic of New Granada, now Colombia. They were three priests: Fr. Henry Tirino, Fr. Gioacchino D'Elia, and Fr. Victor Loyodice, who had been sent by the Holy See to look after the entire territory of Casanare, an old mission of the Jesuits and the Augustinians, who had been abandoned for many years. These missionaries reached the territory allocated to them on 1 November 1859 and immediately began to evangelize indigenous groups and settlers.
As a note sent to Fides on the celebration of 150 years since the first Redemptorist missionaries observes, the mission ended early. One of the missionaries drowned in the river Ariporo, another died of yellow fever while in the boat on the way to the area of Arauca, and the third was expelled from the country by the anti-clerical government of Tomás Cipriano de Mosquera (1862). Meanwhile, the other four candidates who were preparing to strengthen the mission, could not leave Italy because of the revolutionary movements of Garibaldi.
The celebration of the 150th anniversary of this mission in eastern Colombia, was held in Yopal and Paz de Ariporo, in the Department of Casanare, Colombia, November 23 and 24. Archbishop Oscar Urbina of Villavicencio, and Bishop German Meza of Arauca attended the celebration held on the site of the old mission, along with over 80 Redemptorist missionaries, to give glory to God for this missionary seed planted on the American continent a century and a half ago.
Redemptorist Missionaries were among some of the priests recently murdered in March, in the Department of Vichada (see Fides 20/3/2009). In the statement released by the Redemptorists of Colombia the sad fact is recalled: "We offer the sorrows and the loss of these brothers, only 41 and 46 years of age respectively, with the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. We call for justice and we offer Christian forgiveness. We reaffirm our commitment to serve the poor, according to the vocation that we have inherited from San Alfonso Maria de Liguori." (CE) (Agenzia Fides 27/11/2009)
