Mary Song Thi May ‘is a special gift from God bringing His love to her people’ in Mai Yen Parish in Mai Son district.
For more than a decade now, Benedette Marang Ji Grawng has been living in a crowd-ed camp for displaced people in conflict-torn Myanmar.
With each passing day, simple life becomes even more difficult to endure with increasing challenges and hardships, but that hasn’t diminished her faith, says Ji Grawng, a Catholic mother.
“The more difficulties I face, the deeper and stronger my faith becomes. I believe in God who fulfils all our prayers,” says the slightly built 43-year-old Kachin mother of three.
In the midst of her busy daily schedule involving cleaning, cooking, sewing clothes and taking care of a three-year-old child, the devout Catholic finds time to share teachings from the Bible with her two teenage children, aged 16 and 18. “I also send my children to catechism and Bible classes,” Ji Grawng told. “My children are obedient and I am proud to be their mother.”
She lives with her three children and husband, Paul Magi Seng Awng, in a tiny 81 square foot (7.5 sq meter) room in the Catholic Church-run St. Paul Ja Maing Kaung camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs).

A suicide warning at the entrance to Aokigahara Forest, known as Suicide Forest, in Japan’s Yamanashi prefe-cture. It reads: “Life is a precious thing that you have from your parents. Try to calmly think about your parents, brothers and sisters, your children. Please do not keep things to yourself. Talk to someone.”

A television commercial for an energy drink in 1990s Japan told viewers they could work 24 hours straight without feeling tired. The claim, if made today, would be seen as an invitation to karoshi or death caused by overwork.
The most attractive start-ups today are those that offer the possibility of arriving late at work and working from home at least one day a week.
Yet in 2019, there were 29,169 suicides out of which 1,949 or 9.7% were cases of karoshi. The precise causes are to be found in the inability to give up a commitment even if all psycho-physiological sensors tell the body it cannot take this anymore.
This is what happened to Yui (not her real name), a 23-year-old who recently graduated from university. She found a job in Japan’s notorious broadcasting network, NHK. Her aspiration was to make documentaries on social issues.
“It was last year, April 2021. I just graduated from University and was super excited to go work for them. But it was unusual from the beginning,” she recalled.
“After days of hard work, I suddenly realized my body was feeling strange. I felt incredibly tired. And the tiredness wouldn’t go away. That’s when I realized I had been working for 22 days straight,” Yui said.

Krishnagar, July 23, 2022: More than 4,000 people July 23 attended the episcopal ordination of Salesian Bishop Nirmol Vincent Gomes of Krishnagar in West Bengal state.
After the ordination at Cathedral of the Holy Redeemer in Krishnagar, the new bishop asked the gathering to bless him as he takes charge of the diocese. The congregation, – 22 bi-shops, 200 priests and 500 Sisters and some 4,000 faithful – responded extending their right hand in prayerful blessing as the newly ordained Bishop bowed his head in prayer.

Cardinal-Elect Filipe Neri Ferrao of Goa and Daman in the western Indian state of Goa launched the Indian edition of Desiderio Desideravi, Pope Francis’ apostolic letter on the liturgical formation of lay people on July 9. Archbishop Ferrao, president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI), released the book urging Catholics to celebrate the liturgy in a proper, effective and relevant manner.

A Nigerian Catholic priest abducted last week was found murdered   while his colleague managed to escape from his captors in the northern state of Kaduna, the local diocese said.
Fathers John Mark Cheitnum and Donatus Cleophas were seized in the town of Lere when attending a parish function at Christ the King Catholic Church, Yadin Garu last Friday.
On July 19, the body of Cheitnum was found, the Kafanchan diocese said in a statement, adding that he was “brutally killed on the same day of his abduction.”
No one has claimed responsibility for the abduction.
About a dozen priests have been kidnapped this year across Nigeria by gunmen who demand ransom payments. Nigerian security forces, who are stretched fighting an Islamist insurgency in the northeast, often fail to stop the attacks.

An educationist for almost four decades, Salesian Fr Nirmol Vincent Gomes will on July 23 be ordained the bishop of Krish-nagar diocese in West Bengal.
The uncle of the bishop-elect, Bishop Emeritus Theotonius Gomes of Dhaka will preside over the episcopal ordination to be held in Cathedral of the Holy Redeemer Krishnagar.
Dignitaries expected at the event include Vatican Nuncio to India and Nepal Archbishop Leopoldo Girelli and president of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences Salesian Cardinal Charles Bo of Myanmar.

Archbishop Emeritus Raul Nicolau Gonsalves, the first native to head the arch-diocese of Goa-Daman, died July 1 after ailing for the past ten days. The death occurred at 8:45 am at the JMJ Hospital in Alto-Porvorim, 8 km north of Panaji, the capital of Goa. He was 95.

Archbishop Emeritus Joseph Mittathani of Im-phal died July 11, a day before his 91st birthday.
A message from Fr G.P. Amalraj, deputy secretary of the North East India Regional Bishops’ Conference, says the funeral is on July 14 at St. Joseph’s Cathedral Imphal.