Laotian Catholics prepare for Asian Youth Day in Indonesia

Twenty young people from Laos who will join the Asian Youth Day in Indonesia in August, took part in a formation camp over the weekend in the Laotian capital Vientiane.  Three Thai formators conducted the camp at the youth development center of the Sisters of Charity, June 17-18, where the young Catholics from three out of the country’s four ecclesiastical jurisdictions were given exercises in team-building and strengthening their English skills. A Filipina, who has volunteered at the development center for a year, also joined the camp.

A volunteer youth leader Joseph said he is thrilled to have the chance to meet other young Catholics at the Asian Youth Day to be held in Yogyakarta in Semarang Archdiocese, July 30-August 6.  He told UCANEWS the youth meet will “won't just be about our new Laotian cardinal or the 17 martyrs beatified last December that will make the Laotian faith community known to the universal Catholic Church." "The young people and I are ready to be bring testimony of how faith is lived in a communist country in which most citizens are Buddhists," he said.  Joseph was referring to Bishop Louis-Marie Ling Mangkhanekhoun, the Vicar Apostolic of Paksé, whom Pope Francis will make a cardinal on June 28.  Seventeen martyrs, among whom were also foreign missionaries, were beatified in Vientianne last December. "The young people and I are ready to be bring testimony of how faith is lived in a communist country in which most citizens are Buddhists," said 27-year old Joseph, who was the only non-Buddhist in his class at school. Christians make up about 1 percent of Lao's 7 million people of whom about 45,000 are Catholics. 

BK, a government employee from the Khamu ethnic group said that the country's ruling communists had limited their freedom of faith. "But the harder the situation is, the stronger our faith is," he said.  Silae, a 25-year-old layman from Vientiane also spoke of restrictions. “When we are not allowed to build more churches in the capital, we can do more and better in the existing church compound," he said.

Joseph appreciated the Thai trainers saying he received no formal training to become a young leader in the church but "adopts the approach of learning by doing."  When guest speakers come from a foreign country, the youth tend to pay more attention, Joseph said. Spoken Thai and Lao are mutually understood.  (Source: UCAN)