Honiara (Fides Service) - Thanks to the work of volunteers the Catholic mission on Tetere , one of the smaller Solomon Islands is flourishing. Italian volunteers came to work here at the invitation of Salesian Father Luciano Capelli. The experience of foreign volunteers coming for work camps, called “Footsteps” now in its third edition, is a competition in solidarity to help the mission.
The volunteers spend months planning and then building the Mission Centre at Tetere. When it is finished it will have a school, a centre for catechism and communication and professional training school, all part of Christ the King parish.
As the volunteers of group 3, who are from Sondrio in Italy , prepare the return home, a new group of 19 volunteers are on their way. They will be group 4 and they will fit the mission structures with electricity, amplification for the gym at the Volunteer Home which is part of Tetere Mission compound.
The project, which envisages 20 such groups, also includes a plantation of trees, a hospital and huts for livestock breeding.
The Volunteers Home is fundamental for the future development of services in Tetere area where there are a number of villages and a population of about 18,000 people “It is amazing to think that in a few years we have achieved such results thanks to good will on the part of all”, ha said Eleonora, one of the volunteers. “Father Luciano continues to encourage us: he says come on, keep up, keep dreaming! Now the dream of providing a centre for boys and girls of Solomon Islands is coming true”.
(PA) (Agenzia Fides 7/4/2004 lines 26 words 287)