The setting of St Joseph's Retreat House at the Vincentian Formation property in Wailoku, Suva, made a perfect atmosphere for living close to nature during our Spiritual Year. We are nestled in the foothills of the forests of Naitasiri and receive our water from a local source pumped up by the Vincentian students. From the beginning of the year, we made it our business to live as simply as possible, to use the land for planting - and so we cleared ground for dalo (herb), cassava (vegetable) and some green vegetables whose seedlings we put in clay-filled wooden boxes, as suggested to us by Fr Donato Kivi SM.
We also recycled all our organic waste in a home-made plot we had covered with roofing iron, and also organized our paper-bottle-tin waste in different bins. A big challenge in Fiji is the severe lack of rubbish recycling facilities. So even though we did separate our waste, there was no guarantee it would remain that way when brought to the Lami dump.
We hope we will bring forward these theological and practical learnings in whatever places and gardens we will be assigned to in the future.
Fr Donato led us in a workshop entitled 'Marian Ecological Spirituality' - a synopsis of his Roman thesis - which tied a traditional Fijian closeness to the land (vanua) with an equally strong Marian devotion among our Catholics. He did agree that our Wailoku soil and climate was not the best for vegetable growing but gave great advice about planting in raised boxes or furrows so to avoid the worst dampness of our wet climate. We hope we will bring forward these theological and practical learnings in whatever places and gardens we will be assigned to in the future.
We also recycled all our organic waste in a home-made plot we had covered with roofing iron, and also organized our paper-bottle-tin waste in different bins. A big challenge in Suva, and Fiji in general, is the severe lack of rubbish recycling facilities. So even though we did separate our waste, there was no guarantee it would remain that way when brought to the Lami dump.
Fr Donato led us in a workshop entitled 'Marian Ecological Spirituality' - a synopsis of his Roman thesis - which tied a traditional Fijian closeness to the land (vanua) with an equally strong Marian devotion among our Catholics. He did agree that our Wailoku soil and climate was not the best for vegetable growing but gave great advice about planting in raised boxes or furrows so to avoid the worst dampness of our wet climate. We hope we will bring forward these theological and practical learnings in whatever places and gardens we will be assigned to in the future.
Columban Fr Patrick Colgan is the Spiritual Year Socius in Suva, Fiji.
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