The winners with the box of chocolates
“And the First
Prize goes to Sector I & II, R K Puram!” Being the Convener of the
Carol Singing Competition amongst Small Christian Communities of St Thomas, R K
Puram, New Delhi, it was my duty and privilege to declare the results of a hard
fought competition. We Christians are brought up to be modest and attribute
glory, victory, fame, success, etc to others. However, competition does bring
out the best in us. The leader in each SCC unit is the motivator, the
person who builds up excitement and prepares his team or flock for the competition.
2.
Every year the Christmas seasons ends with the grand fete or Christmas tree
programme at the Play-School grounds adjacent to St Thomas Church. Mr.
Thomas Varghese was the General Convener this year with Mr P J Michael (Deputy
Convener), Mrs Sushma Kujur, Mr Stephen and Mr Sanjeev forming the core
committee. There were separate Committees for the stalls, Carol Singing
Competition, Games, PA & Stage, Environment, Tambola, MCs, Gifts and
prizes. Fr Januario Rebello was the Chief Guest. The fete/mela was formally
inaugurated by Fr Rebello. There were 3 big stalls (15x15) on the west, 8
small (15x7.5) on the north and 6 small on the east side. Apart
from games stalls we had food stalls giving seek kababs, chole bhature, rolls,
kheema parota, kachori sabzi, cup cakes, pork with pav, idli sambar, kabab
rolls, tea, coffee, momos, pakoras, cool drinks, water, etc.
President, SCC Unit Sector I & II, Smt Lalita Baxla
The involvement of the entire Unit
3. Of late, Sector I & II, R K Puram has been doing
exceedingly well. During the Family Diwas
they bagged the First Prize. They
organized the Christmas Carols well in their neighbourhood park. I was keen to know what clicks with this
unit, what’s so special that they excel in all activities. I decided to visit the leaders and have a
talk. I prepared a long questionnaire to
facilitate interaction and not to leave out any important point. Mr Mukti Prakash has been active in taking
photographs and sharing the same. I have
on several occasions used his photos for displaying in the Church. I called him to fix a meeting for Friday
evening (15/1/16) at the church. He was
however unable to spare time as they had a get-together of their SCC unit that
evening. I could not have missed this
opportunity and got myself invited. I reached
before the members arrived and hence got the time to enquire about the
community, its leadership and the reason for its consistent performance.
Mr. Mukti Prakash Mr Ajit Dung Dung
4. Mrs Lalita Baxla is the President of Sector I & II, R K
Puram SCC Unit. Mr Mukti Prakash and Mr.
Ajit Dung Dung are the Church Support Fund Collectors of Sector I and II
respectively. Mr. Shanti Prakash is the
Vice President. Mrs Angela and Mr B
Antony are the unit leaders. Although
there are different units, its members want to be part of the whole group
without any division. There are several
tribal families from different regions and tribes. There are also Tamil, Telegu and Bengali
families in the unit. Almost all the
families are reside in the government flats.
However, there are some Catholic families which are occupying hutments
or juggis in the vicinity who are members of this SCC unit.
5. There are several reasons for a vibrant Small Christian
Community. Good leadership is a major
contributor. The leader has to be such
that every member can relate to him/her. Every leader has his or her own style of
leadership. We have broadly five
leadership styles, namely; (i) Authoritarian (ii) Paternalistic (iii)
Democratic, (iv) Laissez-faire and (v) Transactional. Every leader uses a mix of these. Depending on one’s style, situation,
objective, team, etc, the style of leadership or proportion of the mix of
styles would vary. While the President
was more inclined to opt for the Paternalistic style the next level of leaders
were more comfortable in the Laissez-faire and Transactional styles. Under the Laissez-faire the members have
complete freedom to make decisions and in Transactional leadership works through
a system of rewards to motivate its members. The combination was working very
well in this SCC unit. Church leadership
needs to motivate people to come together and witness Christ. We may be good Christians as individuals and
even as a family. But we also need to be
visible as a witnessing community. We
have to be visible as a community which stands out for its values, love, care,
understanding, helpfulness, cheerfulness, positivity, showing the presence of
the living God. For all this, we must be
able to come together as one family. All
our actions are for the ultimate Glory of God.
That is the litmus test to be applied when we plan each activity for the
Community -- would it lead to the Glory of God?
6. On enquiring about SCC meetings, I was told that the meetings
have been erratic but they have Mass once in three months. We all have seen how the Mass brings the community
together. At Netaji Nagar we experienced
that very few families attended SCC meetings but many would be there for the Mass. All members of the family also came for Mass
whereas only some individuals came for SCC meetings or even for Rosary. The fundamental requirement is to come
together in the presence of the Lord. It
can be Mass, meetings or Rosary.
‘Wherever two or three are gathered in My name, I am in the their midst’
says the Lord. Nothing is comparable to
the Mass for bringing people together.
7. The unit won the prize of Rs
2500/ on Family Diwas. They pooled in some more money and all went to Deer Park
for a picnic. I am sure the public in
Deer Park would have noticed something different, something good in this group
on that day. On winning this year’s
Carol Singing Competition the prize was a box full of 5 Star chocolates. Unbelievable but true, box was opened on the
community celebration day, and I happened to join them. Fr Suman was given the honour of formally
opening the box and distributing the chocolates. The community organized the get-together to
celebrate and thank the Lord. On that
day a child celebrated his birthday with a huge cake, more than 50 loving
people around, and more than 10 mobiles
and cameras recording the beautiful moment.
That’s birthday celebration.
Isn’t it more fun like this than with just three people around? Learning
to celebrate each other’s happiness and share sorrows is one objective of the
SCC movement.
8. Here was an SCC unit with several children aged one year to
college going kids. Their innocence, trust, love, playfulness, etc add life to
SCC units. Sector I & II remain blessed
with the presence of children. For
children what better environment can you give- memories of growing up among loved ones, away
from bad elements, in the presence of the Lord, away from TV, interacting with
loving, caring and God fearing people.
This is the experience of a joint family, the experience of growing up
with siblings, cousins, near and dear ones.
The Church provides us this atmosphere in today’s chaotic world full of
distractions.
9. The carol that they sang was ‘Bethlehem ke goshalay may’. They hoped to win last year when they sang
the same song. They decided to sing the
same song again but with more practice.
‘Practice’, that’s the key word. Although they modestly said that they could
not practice much, the fact that they sang the same song was practice in
itself. Secondly, they sang only one
carol. No gimmicks, no mixing of several
carols, no mixing of several languages and yet took the First Prize. There is a lesson to be learnt here. We need to focus on the main objective. The objective and requirement was to present
Carols preferably with supporting instruments and large number of people. Many of us invested our time and effort,
precious as they were, on learning new carols, learning new languages, learning
how to jump from one rhythm to another, etc.
Sector I & II simply focused on just one carol, one they had sung
last year, a melody they all knew. Allen
accompanied on the keyboard and Sunil Ekka played the Guitar. The carol was well-rehearsed, melodious, sung
beautifully, accompanied by the right music and the nativity scene. They got better score for effectively using
the accompanying instruments, for presentation, for the music and audience
response.
Can you see Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus?
10. Thirteen (13) teams participated in the carol singing
competition. One team was collaboration
between Sector 9 and Moti Bagh. That is
a total of 14 SCC units which participated out of 24 SCC units that we have in
our Parish. Some of the SCC units, many
of our specialized groups of the church like Mahila Sangh, STAY, Junior
Youth, etc had put up stalls. All these
activities nurture Christian leadership.
As youth animator I tell the youth of the parish and also their parents
that those who come forward and take up responsibilities in the church as a
youth are the ones who would do well in their interviews, in the group
discussions, in their careers and take up more challenging responsibilities in
life. In the house of the Lord you can
sharpen your skills of leadership without much worry of ridicule or being
hauled up for a mistake or wrong decision.
We need to show the way so that more people are encouraged to come
forward and learn the art of good leadership, at no cost.
"The harvest is plentiful, but the
laborers are few; therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out
laborers into His harvest. "Go; behold, I send you out as
lambs in the midst of wolves.
Luke 10:2
