Travelling on the road of faith, hope and charity for TAF
It is almost a year ago since Deacon Adrian and I toyed with the idea of producing material that is easy to read for all Catholics. We had several conversations through WhatsApp and Zoom because he lives in Kuala Lumpur and I, in Singapore.
We agreed on a plan that if we were to do anything, it would be on a “Simple writing, simple reading” formula. But we had no clue initially on how to go about doing this or what medium it should be on or where we are going to get more help.
If it would be books, booklets, pamphlets or something else, was a question that continuously nagged at us.
We thought a website would be cool, but neither of us was at the level of creating one. It had been quite a while since I started my own blog, and was a little rusty. Besides, there are tons of Catholic websites on the Internet, why would anyone want to come to ours?
That was another question that had been nagging at us.
Our goal, though, is to help Catholics understand our faith better. It is not meant to teach those already neck-deep in studying Catholicism, but if we can contribute anything to their journey, that would be a bonus.
We want to cast our nets far and wide to all Catholics in Malaysia and Singapore, but primarily to those who are trying to understand and learn our faith, including students.
Our language style should, therefore, be easy to understand. As far as possible, we wanted to try and avoid terms that get people scratching their heads. This is no easy task, but we wanted to try.
In this light, we had conversations with a few Catholics who we felt were well-grounded in the faith, but that effort produced nothing. Just as our Lord Jesus Christ lamented that “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” (Luke 10:2-4)
So, instead of twiddling our thumbs, both of us prayed. We had to have faith.
During Advent last year a handful of promising names emerged. On Christmas Day I started writing at a site that hosted bloggers, just to keep our hopes alive. Then, on Ash Wednesday, two Catholics decided to join our mission: Jonathan Ho and Clement Wee from Singapore.
A few days later, Sister Shirley Chong came on board. She is a Daughters of St Paul Sister from Malaysia and based in Manila.
Our pace accelerated from then on and after several conversations, through Zoom and WhatsApp across Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, we decided to set up a website. We also agreed that we should cast our nets even further in Asia, and not just Malaysia and Singapore.
But baby steps first. We need to learn how to walk before we start jogging and then running. We also settled on our name, The Asian Fishermen, because we want to obey Christ’s Commission to everyone in His Church to evangelise. But we are going to do this through simple means and in our simple way.
As our journey crossed major Church days and seasons, we planned for our website to go live on Easter Sunday. But midway through our journey I fell ill and had to recuperate. The team decided they did not want to launch this mission without everyone on board.
So, we all agreed that the next important date available should be Pentecost Sunday, the day the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles and send them on their way to fulfill Christ’s Great Commission of spreading the Gospel to the ends of the world.
We are here, then, on this day, to do our small part in this work for Jesus Christ. None of us have any clue where we are going or how The Asian Fishermen, or TAF, will develop. But we place our faith in the Holy Spirit to lead us where He wills us to go.
A happy and blessed Pentecost!
