A newly constructed presbytery for a young parish

The parish of Chondonpara in the Diocese of Tura in eastern India is still very new, having only been founded in October 2024. The new presbytery was inaugurated at the same time, thanks to the generosity of our benefactors, who donated $60,000 for this purpose. They celebrated with a great feast, which was attended by the bishop, many of his priests and religious sisters from the diocese, and a large number of Catholic faithful.

The new parish was created from the split of one vast parish, which had comprised 119 villages and over 21,000 faithful. Previously, it was not possible to adequately minister to all the Catholics in the area, which also lies in a mountainous region covered by rainforest. Most of the faithful belong to the Indigenous Garo tribe and live in great poverty. The priest is the person they turn to for every need, and consequently he needs to be accessible. He therefore needed a place to stay in this new parish and that is why Bishop Andrew Marak turned to ACN for help.

The building had to be solidly constructed, since the region is prone to earth tremors. It was not easy. The building site is on the edge of the forest, and the building workers were frightened by the wild elephants that wandered onto the site. And it was also very difficult to transport the necessary building materials along the unpaved roads. On a number of occasions, trucks got stuck the last few kilometres away from the village. Finally, the village has no electricity, which again added to the difficulty of the building work. But the house was finally built, and there was great rejoicing among the people.

“Without your help we could not have begun, and much less finished this important project. The new parish house will be a source of so much good. The presence of the priest will be an enormous help for the activities of this new parish. The faithful will always remember ACN in their prayers and pray for all your benefactors, for the many sacrifices they have made so that this project could become reality.”