One of the missions of Butare community is formation of the pre-postulants.
Here pre-postulant Maria Ahok Wek, from Uganda, shares her experience of apostolate in a school for the hearing-impaired students.
We are in the pre-postulate at Butare community, Rwanda. This program aims at giving a progressive entry into the formation process of MSOLA religious missionary life. We have many introductory classes which help us know more about the congregation, consecrated life, how to journey together as a group, to be aware of what is taking place within oneself and around us, to know more about the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the Bible and its origin. We are also introduced and initiated to prayer and community life, Apostolate, Actualization of the Vital Human strengths, how to become a Peace builder, to solve various conflicts in a nonviolent way and many other introductory classes.
I am Maria Ahok Wek, I came from Uganda, Arua diocese, Moyo parish which is located in Northern Uganda. I would like to share with you about my apostolate in Butare, Rwanda.
I am sent for apostolate to the Montfort Brothers of St. Gabriel’s School of Hearing Impairment. In this School, I bring hope to the students through helping them discover their talents through games and sports. I hope that some students may develop this into a career. I do this in collaboration with the administration and the staff members in making sure that the students’ talents are efficiently and effectively promoted, with the hope of continuity of this physical education even when I may not be around.
I believe that each individual is gifted differently and being poor in book-learning does not mean lacking knowledge or having a future. Sports is one of the best and well-paid careers in the world today but many people including Educators don’t see anything good in it. To effectively implement and promote the sports, I first have to clear the misconception about sports by bringing to the school attention that participating in sports has a positive impact in academics because it relaxes students which helps them understand better what is taught in the class. In other words, it boosts the brain and students’ wellbeing and helps them perform better academically in class.
Sports encourage students to organize well their time so that they can both go for practice and finish their class/home work on time. It also builds good leadership and teamwork, creates friendship with different people, and most of all aims at a future career. This is what I am doing to bring hope to Hearing-Impaired students in hopes that some students will discover their career and I pray that it may continue in my absence.
In conclusion, I believe that this apostolate will impact students positively in their studies, health-wise, leadership and teamwork, socially and in their future career.
