Fr Paul: Practice inclusion, hospitality while celebrating 38th anniversary

By CHRSITINE PAKAKOTA

‘‘WE the people of Papua New Guinea, united in one nation, pay homage to the memory of our ancestors, the source of our strength, and origin of our combined heritage.

‘‘We acknowledge the wealthy customs and traditional wisdoms of our people which has come down to us from generation to generation

‘‘We pledge ourselves to guard and pass on to those who come after us, our noble traditions and the Christian principles that are ours now.’’

That is what the students at the St Joseph’s International Catholic College in Port Moresby recited during the pre-independence celebrations mass yesterday.

“When one person celebrates their birthday, it’s just one celebration but if it is a nation, there are many celebrations everywhere and a lot of gifts also,”  college executive director Fr Pauil Jennings said.”

“We receive many gifts from all over the world but I believe the best gift that we receive was the gift we gave ourselves was the gift of our constitution, the constitution of PNG.”

He told the students that what they were currently celebrating was the guarding and passing on their noble traditional and Christian principle.

He shared with them two virtues that covered noble tradition and Christian principles.

“Inclusion, years ago everybody was included because everybody was needed to keep the village alive and in Christianity, Jesus died for everyone. Nobody is excluded from Jesus’ love, God’s love is shown through us in Jesus Christ.”

The second virtue was hospitality which said in traditional societies, whenever there were visitors, everyone was welcome.

“In Christian principle, God welcomes everyone. Let’s practise inclusion and hospitality while we are celebrating this 38th birthday.”