My name is João Patrolino, known a
s João Bala, I am consecrated in the Community for 26 years, and it is with a great joy that I am living today in mission in the city of Maputo, Mozambique, in Africa. Mozambique has more or less 30 millions inhabitants. There are 11 provinces.
We are living in Maputo, the capital of the country, where there are more than 1 million inhabitants. Mozambique has been one of the last colony to become independent from the Portugal, 42 years ago, in 1976. One year after its independence, the country entered in a great civil war which lasted 16 years.
Even today, the country bears the marks of these issues in the economic, political and social life. The religious prevalence are the animist sects, Catholicism, and Islamism. The Muslims are involved into 90% of the national trade and are very integrated in the national economy through it.
I arrived on the 21st of April, the other missionaries on the 28th of May, and on the 10th of July, a young in mission from Fortaleza is going to arrive. Thank God, evangelisation already started here, thanks to the openness of the people here, and thanks to the language, I am already preaching for the young in the university, and accompanying several persons in this context.
I can see that the doors are getting opened, just as the heart of the people here, the pastoral work already began and I am very glad, because with this social inequality here, where we can see very as much as very poor and very rich persons, I can see a great opportunity of evangelization.
We are preparing ourselves to continue, to go beyond what we can even imagine, and I believe that Shalom spirituality has much to bring to the African Continent.
João Patrolino