{"id":329410,"date":"2017-08-22T00:10:32","date_gmt":"2017-08-21T22:10:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/nigeria-dawn-of-a-new-day\/"},"modified":"2024-05-16T15:08:05","modified_gmt":"2024-05-16T13:08:05","slug":"nigeria-dawn-of-a-new-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/nigeria-dawn-of-a-new-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigeria: Dawn of a new day"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201c\"2017-05I had only been married a short while when my husband fell gravely ill. At the same time I discovered I was pregnant.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>This is how one Nigerian woman\u2019s story begins. Far from her own family and alone, she asked her husband\u2019s family for help, but only found closed doors.\u00a0\u201cWe lived through hell,\u201d<\/em> she said. Fortunately other doors opened soon after: those of Casa Alba.<\/strong> And for her, like many other young women in difficulty, a new day began.\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know how I would have survived otherwise. Now, thanks to God, things have gotten better.\u201d<\/em> Casa Alba is one of the Focolare Movement\u2019s<\/a> projects in Nigeria<\/a>. For many years, it was once just called a \u201cgen house\u201d (for \u201cnew generation\u201d, the young people of the Focolare). Only later did Chiara Lubich<\/a> propose naming it \u201cAlba\u201d (\u201cdawn\u201d), with the hope that it might become a true house for many vulnerable girls from all over Nigeria. Here many \u2013 some were living on the street \u2013 have been welcomed and learned a trade. Both sewing work (which became a course in itself) and batik (the art of dying fabric), which at first were just a way to earn some money, have become a true recovery project. Spiritual and ethical training are also integral parts of the program. In May Casa Alba<\/strong> celebrated its 25th anniversary at the Mariapolis Center of Onitsha \u2013 an entire weekend with a concluding mass outdoors. Four hundred people were invited, many of whom donned typical brightly colored African coloring, decorated with batik techniques. Auxiliary Bishop Denis Chidi Isizoh, celebrated the mass.\u00a0<\/strong>\u201cFocolare means fire,\u201d<\/em> he said during the homily. \u201cIt is the fire of encouragement, of evangelization, of love.\u201d<\/em> He described the times he had met Chiara Lubich personally, when he worked with Cardinal Arinze at the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. \u201cA French scholar once wrote, \u2018I think therefore I am.\u2019 No African would ever say this. Africans would say \u2018We are, therefore I am.\u2019 I am a person because I belong to a community, to a group. This is what the members of the Focolare Movement tell us: when we are united like a community, that is when we find ourselves.\u201d<\/em> \"2017-05Let\u2019s go back for a moment.<\/strong> Some time ago Elde de Souza,<\/strong> who directs Casa Alba, visited Bishop Denis<\/strong> to inform him of funding difficulties that the project was having and that activities would have to be suspended. In response, the bishop renewed his faith in the program and relaunched it. Instead of its closing, he proposed celebrating Casa Alba\u2019s 25th anniversary in grand style. \u201cThe Focolare in Nigeria is too quiet!\u201d<\/em> he said. His proposal was too good to ignore, and the entire community mobilized. Everyone, old and young, got to work. Bishop Denis\u2019s enthusiasm is contagious. \u201cNigeria is a happy place. We are happy people. Yet some are not, and are in really difficult situations.\u00a0<\/em>This is what life is about,\u201d\u00a0<\/em> he says, concluding that we are all able to unite our sufferings to those of Jesus on the cross. At the celebration, all the Casa Alba \u201cgirls\u201d are present.<\/strong> Some are teens; others are already grandmothers. The celebration is a chance to retrace paths and stories. \u201cIt changed me and my life.\u201d \u201cBefore I had a short temper, but here I calmed down.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>\u201cIt is wonderful to hear how this small seed produced so much fruit,\u201d<\/em> says Mama Regina, 83, one of the early teachers. The next day, the newspaper of the archdiocese (which has 2 million Catholics), called the anniversary \u201ca colorful spectacular.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>\u201cThe Focolare Movement has dried the tears of hopeless young people, who today live above the poverty line thanks to the skills acquired at Casa Alba.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>The event was covered on radio and television, and the regional newspaper printed a call to raise funds to relaunch the project. A new day is beginning for Casa Alba as well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For 25 years Casa Alba has opened its doors to vulnerable girls, offering them the possibility of restarting their lives with dignity and hope.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[893],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-329410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-focolare-worldwide-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329410\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}