By Matters India Reporter
Bengaluru, Dec 23, 2019: The Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI), the national body of the Latin rite bishops in the country, will open extension of its secretariat in Goa.
Shanti Sadan (house of peace) is coming up at Benaulim, nearly 40 km south of Panaji, capital of Goa. Cardinal Oswald Cardinal Gracias, the Archbishop of Bombay, will open the secretariat on January 6, according to a press release from the CCBI secretariat based in Bengaluru.
Archbishop Filipe Neri Ferrão of Goa and CCBI president will unveil the plaque and bless the ground floor. CCBI vice president Archbishop George Antonysamy of Madras Mylapore will bless the first floor and give the homily during the opening Mass.
Archbishop Anil Couto of Delhi and the CCBI secretary general will bless the second floor.
CCBI Commissions of Liturgy and Family will operate from Shanti Sadan. Father Ayres Fernandes, executive secretary to the CCBI Commission for Liturgy, is appointed as the administrator of the house. The conference will organize small animation and training programs from the three story building with 25 self-contained rooms that can accommodate 40 persons.
It has a chapel, conference and dining halls. The extension building is situated at the birth place of Saint Joseph Vaz, the Apostle of Sri Lanka.
The CCBI has five secretariat buildings in India, Suvarta Kendra, at Pachmarhi, Madhya Pradesh, is the secretariat of the CCBI Commission for Proclamation. Bethania, Faridabad, Haryana, is the CCBI Youth Commission Secretariat, the one at Ulsoor, Bangalore, is the secretariat of the Pontifical Mission Organisation (PMO).
The CCBI deputy secretary general and four other Commission secretaries operate from its Bengaluru building.
CCBI has 16 commissions and three departments where 23 personnel work as executive secretaries or directors.
The CCBI is the largest bishops’ conference in Asia and the fourth largest in the world. It consists of 132 dioceses with 190 bishops.