“ROME WAS NOT BUILT IN A DAY”

I fondly remember a chat I had with a friend some time back referring to the present generation vis-à-vis life’s commitments today. I quite remember him say the following: “In my opinion, the NOW generation’s biggest fault is a lack of patience to get things done; and when it comes to their own businesses – it’s a burning desire to make a lot of money quick and retire young.” Well, as you can rightly guess, this was a conversation about the current world of the young people and how they are chiefly influenced by the capitalistic mercantile mentality.
Being a mutual conversation, I too did contribute a lot to it, but little did I realize that I am as well a product of the same generation. Despite the rigorous religious formation I have received over the years, I still have a lot of this generation’s stuff in me.
It was just last week when we (the three first Consolata missionaries in Taiwan) begun our studies of the Chinese language. The enthusiasm of starting to learn this “hard nut” was so evident in our faces as we mumbled some incomprehensible Chinese words. But this blissful time, this enthusiasm soon faded away as we came to our senses that this will not be achieved any soon. What is really required here is PATIENCE!!!!!
Now, this is the famous word that lacks in the dictionary of the people of this generation as I noted at the beginning. A little bit of disappointment started being evident in our gloomy faces as the nut was getting harder day-after-day. This is when we remembered the famous English say: “ROME WAS NOT BUILT IN A DAY”. This has actually become our refrain, our strength, our consolation and our motto. It is possible; yes, we can make it, with patience.
We want to thank the Consolata Missionaries, the Bishop and the local Church as well as all of you, our well wishers, who have given us a wonderful support right from the start. May the Lord always be with you! Together we shall build this new mission of the Lord with PATIENCE since “Rome was not built in a day”.