Gabon: A family at the service of others

“The couple, married for 28 years and with four children, three of which remained in Lubumbashi (Congo) for their University studies, had discovered God as Love and had placed Him as their first priority as a couple and this was the spiritual basis of their decision to leave everything to follow Christ’s calling.

For some time now the Movement’s community in Gabon had been asking for a new focolare in Libreville. And this was why in 2011, we were sent as a “focolare-family.”

We decided to place ourselves at the service of the movement, leaving our jobs and moving to a new land. We had never been separated from our children for such a long time. It was not easy but the whole family agreed to our decision. Of course, there were unknown aspects we would have had to face… but we put our trust in God who is Love.

Upon our arrival in Gabon our first and foremost task was to strengthen our mutual love as a couple. And due to this, our love grew stronger and helped us to start anew in loving each other and all those we met along the way.

Here we found a really warm community, and with such helpful and generous people, despite the poverty. We travelled a lot across the country to also meet the farthest communities, and were welcomed with enthusiasm everywhere. In some villages we even found people lined up along the road, waving branches of the trees growing along the road, as a sign of their joy. The Christian families here, as in the rest of Africa, have suffered the setbacks of socio-cultural changes, which called for our positive reaction. We are helping many couples accomplish their journey of faith, and as of today, many have received the sacrament of marriage and others are still preparing to do so.

We have strongly experienced God’s providence, starting from the house for the movement’s activities which was a gift from the Archbishop of Libreville. To refurbish it, each one in the community brought what they could: a bed, mattress, pair of bed sheets, stove, fork, plate… At the same time, all the communities of Gabon went all out to concretely help us with our daily needs. Regularly, they sent us cassava, rice, bananas… often the doorbell would ring and to our surprise, we would find what we needed at our doorstep. Unity, love, and faith in the words of the Gospel helped us to overcome the unending difficulties we encountered: unemployment, illnesses, misunderstandings….

After three years we returned to Lubumbashi. Our children had all grown, also in terms of maturity. Also under this aspect, we saw that the Gospel is true. It was a great joy to see them again and we felt a deep unity with each of them.

When we left once again, they renewed their willingness to “send us out” again on a mission which consists in helping people to meet God, also through our mutual love, the warmth of the family and our unity, and the great desire of the community of Gabon to have a real focolare.”

Jeanne and Augustin Mbwambu