Daughters of St. Paul, Pakistan

The Daughters of Saint Paul is a Roman Catholic religious order for women.^[1]

History

The Congregation of the Daughters of St. Paul was founded on June 15, 1915 in Alba, Italy. The congregation came to Pakistan at the invitation of Bishop Francis Cialeo of Faisalabad in 1958.^[2]

There are 12 nuns, five of whom are local women, 8 novices and 20 aspirants. Sister Daniela Baronchelli who has worked in Pakistan for 22 years founded the first local community of the Daughters of St Paul in Karachi.^[3]

In every mission they put evangelisation first, followed by programmes of spiritual and material assistance to the poor with a series of initiatives: social centres, medical care, education. They give special attention to children and young people. In Pakistan they have a primary and a secondary school and various other activities.^[4]

Karachi

The inauguration of a book shop in Karachi in 1966 by Archbishop Joseph Cordeiro was the first in a Muslim country. The sisters served the community by offering prayer books, bibles and religious articles. This book centre was reconsecrated by Archbishop Evarist Pinto in June 30, 2005.^[1]

The police raided the Sisters' bookshop in Karachi in June 2005, for allegedly issuing literature or materials which hurt the feelings or beliefs of other religions. The Daughters of St. Paul have been selling CDs, videos and Christian literature and material about the Christian religion and moral teachings in Karachi since 1948.^[5]

Lahore

In January 1968, Sr. Ignatia Balla, the superior general in Rome visited Pakistan to determine the need for the opening of a second community in Lahore upon the request of the Bishops from the Punjab. On 27 July 1968, four sisters started work in Lahore. Four religious books for adults and four books for children were published in Urdu. The Sisters also welcomed the first Pakistani vocations.^[1] The sisters are involved in the wider area of communications. Sister Magdaline Ishaq chaired a World Communications Day seminar at her convent in Lahore on April 27, 2008. The nuns run three communications centers in Lahore, Karachi and Rawalpindi. The Daughters of St. Paul also conducted one-hour lectures on communication and its effects in a number of Catholic schools.^[6] The sisters also have a bookshop on the premises of the Sacred Heart Cathedral, Lahore. The Cathedral was one of several buildings damaged or destroyed by a bomb blast in Lahore in May 2009.^[7]

The shops of the Sisters in the main cities also act as the main channel of distribution for the products of WAVE Studio.^[8]

In 2016, Sister Athens Angeles of the Daughters of St. Paul held a lesson for their sisters, encouraging them to use social networks with a missionary purpose. According to Angeles this opens up “the possibility of new vocations, better understanding of the mission at a local level, elevation of the dignity of women, opportunities for dialogue with the modern world and greater support to pastoral work".^[9]

Islamabad-Rawalpindi

In 2006, two Sisters from Karachi started a new home in the diocese of Islamabad-Rawalpindi, where a book shop had already been built in front of the Bishop’s House.^[1] In January 2012 a youth group from the Cathedral Parish launched a new website for realising the potential of youth and expressing their concerns in a Christian way. It is hoped that the website will also help counter fundamentalism and fanaticism.^[10]

References