The cover of the September 1996 issue of ‘Contact’, a publication of the Asian Chaplaincy, featured a group photo of the pilgrimage to the Holy Land that year.
PANAJI
From the celebration of Masses and offering spiritual services to providing counselling and organising socio-cultural activities, the Pilar Society has been rendering yeoman’s service to the Goan community in the UK for over three decades.
The Pilar Society began its mission in the UK in 1988 not just to provide services to Goans settled in the UK, but also to promote the Cause of Beatification of Venerable Fr Agnelo and to promote the cause of missionary activities of the Pilar Society.
Fr Francis Carvalho, currently Professor of Canon Law at the Pilar Mission Seminary at Pilar, was the first Pilar Father who was instrumental in the establishment of the Pilar Mission in UK.
When contacted, Fr Carvalho provided an extensive account on the aims and objectives of the Pilar Society in setting up its Mission in the UK, the challenges in setting up its mission in a new country and some of the main activities and responsibilities of the Pilar Fathers during its early years in the UK.
“Late Fr Sergio Mascarenhas SFX (the Vice-Postulator to the Cause of Beatification of Venerable Fr Agnelo) had envisioned the Mission of Pilar Fathers in UK, mainly for the purpose of promoting the Cause of Beatification of Venerable Fr Agnelo among Goans settled down in the UK as well as for the promotion of the cause of missionary activities of Society of Pilar in India,” Fr Carvalho told The Goan.
“During one of his visits to UK, Fr Sergio had contacted several Goans who were interested in the promotion of this Cause, including the Asian Chaplain (Fr Arthur Moraes, of Goan origin but a priest of the Archdiocese of Westminster). It was this Asian Chaplain who had promised Fr Sergio that he would provide for the lodge and board to the Pilar priest sent to UK for the promotion of this Cause.”
It was in 1988 that Fr Carvalho landed in the premises of the Asian Chaplaincy, which was under the Archdiocese of Westminster.
The Asian Chaplain had planned to place four priests of Asian origin in different parishes in UK so that their services could be made available mainly to the spiritual/pastoral needs of the Asians in each of these areas.
“I was placed, as a guest-priest, in the Leyton Parish in East London, which belonged to the Diocese of Brentwood. Since I had no official appointment from the Bishop of Brentwood, I could move easily to different Asian families, whose ethnicity was either Goan (mostly, migrated from Kenya/Nairobi and Uganda), or Anglo-Indian, or Ceylonese, or Mauritian, or Singaporean or Filipino,” said Fr Carvalho.
While Fr Carvalho catered to the spiritual needs, mainly of Goans and Filipinos, in East London, he also pursued the main purpose of the Mission of Pilar Fathers in UK, that is, the promotion of devotion to Venerable Fr Agnelo in UK.
“Even as Fr Sergio Mascarenhas had done the groundwork for our new Mission in UK, with the help of the devotees of Venerable Fr Agnelo in UK, I was new both to UK and to these devotees. Besides, I was lone Pilar Priest in UK at the beginning – hence I had to be in constant contact with my Superiors in Pilar Goa,” said Fr Carvalho.
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