By the grace of God, framed within the 20th anniversary of the establishment of the Missio, we could celebrate, together with the faithful of the parish, the Feast of Our Patroness, the Pure and Immaculate Virgin of Lujan.

On Sunday, May 6th, at the parish of St. Joseph in Dushanbe, to begin with, we first had the Holy Mass in honor of Our Blessed Mother, presided over by Fr. Pedro López, the Superior of the mission, in which our novice, Timur Rinatovich, received the sacrament of Confirmation and the holy habit of the religious. For this occasion, his mother, Ala, traveled from Khabarovsk, Russia. At the close of the Mass, a replica of the Virgin of Lujan was blessed and will be enthroned, God-willing, in the parish of St. Rocco in Kurgán Tiubé.

Secondly, we had a festive dinner with the traditional entertainment, in which several songs were sung in honor of Mary Most Holy, and a skit was presented: “The ideal novice”, with three priests of the Missio showing their exceptional talent for acting.

On Monday, May 7th, as is custom here, we prayed the Office of Readings in honor of Mary, and on the following day, May 8th, we celebrated our Patroness anew in the Holy Mass that evening. We culminated the festivities with dinner on this day, where not only the religious of our Institutes gathered, but also the sisters Missionaries of Charity

We give thanks to God for having honored this dear nation with the special protection of his Holy Mother, the Virgin of Lujan, Patroness of Tajikistan, whom we trust and to whom we commend all our apostolic works in this country, especially the edification of a Shrine in her honor and for the foundation of the contemplative monastery here.

United in the Incarnate Word,

The Religious Family in Tajikistan