After a nice long break in Tsibogang, our work starts again the in first week of January – as in recent years – with the first workshop, the Counseling workshop 33 members of Tlamelang have signed up , about 18 of them stayed in St. Joseph , the Retreat Centre right next to our Tsibogang Centre. For the first time two members of Tsibogang cooked for us, which was above all a great financial relief for our budget. For the two however, it was not easy to prepare every day three meals all for us. But it worked out well , there were no complaints .
The topic of the week was: “Self acceptance and accept one another “, taken from the motto of the year 2015: “ccept one another, then, just as Christ also accepted you, in order to bring praise to God“ (Romans 15.7). Every morning we had a Bible study with reflections and group discussions thereafter. The text on Tuesday morning was Psalm 8,1ff : God has not only accepted but gave us honour and glory . In the groups we shared how God had provided for some of us in the past. On two days we had one to one counselling ; it was very special to get to know each other better during these times of mutual sharing.
In the Bible study about the motto of the year, one of the questions was : How would your life look like if you would accept others as Christ has accepted you? Wednesday morning we had a session about our shadow selves. Wolfgang Hermann spoke about a chapter from the book “Signs of spirituality” by Trevor Hudson. Shadow selves is all that we cannot or do not want to accept in our person. At the beginning we did a test that exactly highlighted: Often we see better at other people what we tend to ignore in ourselves. The tasks in the groups was to tackle this. We realized quickly that changing one’s behaviour is easier said than done ; but already the conversation about it was worth it.
In the afternoon we read and translated into Setswana the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous: What is needed to see a real difference in my life? These steps help everyone with difficulties and how to deal with it and do practical steps to overcome them. Here are some of the steps are quoted
The 12 Steps of Narcotics Anonymous
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We admitted that we were powerless over our addiction, that our lives had become unmanageable.
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We came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
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We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
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We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
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We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
12.Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
On the last two days of the workshop , we got a glimpse of a program for young people , which is widely used in the Catholic Church . Five members of Tsibogang took part in a workshop which gave an introduction into this program. “Education for Life” wants to make young people aware of where their path is going to and to help them to achieve their goals and values. Jesus, as the centre of these decisions, is the “living water ” (after John 4,7 to 16 ). The idea is to share this with children in our Afternoon care programs and the children we meet on a daily basis.
On the last day of the workshop, we had an impressive role play on: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are burdened.I will give you rest” (Matth. 11,28). Gaolatlheope and Lorato showed us, how difficult it often is to let go off our burdens. We prefer to walk around with them, knowing that to release these burdens would also mean changing your own life. At the end of the workshop we were invited to write down our burdens and leave them with Jesus.
Christel Lorato Hermann