By Francis Sunil Rosario
Kolkata: With the death of Archbishop Lucan Sirkar on April 18, the Church in Bengal lost a stalwart leader whose major concern was to build local leadership with local resources.
Archbishop Lucas succeeded Archbishop Henry D’Souza on April 14, 2000, and remained Archbishop until Feb 23, 2012.
During those 12 years his sincere efforts were to build local leadership, promoting local vocations for future mission. His efforts resulted in many local vocations from Santhal, Adivasis communities. Vocations came also from Odisha and Bengal states.
Many priests who serve the archdiocese now are basically from local grassroots. That’s certainly Archbishop Sirkar’s great contribution to the Church.
I am indebted to him for entrusting me with important offices in the archdiocese.
He appointed me the dean of Howrah-Hooghly and Kolkata city Deanery. I was appointed editor of The Herald, the diocesan weekly. He also encouraged me to promote Bangla Herald. Besides being pro vicar of the Cathedral of the Most Holy Rosary since May 1, 2002, I was one of the archdiocesan consulters and a member of the Archdiocesan Finance Committee.
He promoted the dialogue and ecumenical ministries in the archdiocese and encouraged me to get involved in interreligious dialogue and ecumenism. What was marvelous about his leadership was that he gave total freedom to people execute their ministries. He was available whenever his presence was required to deal with some areas of concern.
When he found none to take up the new emerging church at the periphery of Bypass in Picnic Garden, he turned to me. The new church had no appropriate structures. That was one of the most difficult challenges in all my diocesan appointments over the years. In faith I accepted the mission and the rest is history.
Today Church of Our Lady of Vailankanni is one of the leading churches in Kolkata archdiocese. The church was established due to the support of Archbishop Sirkar.
As the archbishop he had to balance his commitment to the local concerns with the demands of the existing structures.
In his tenure as archbishop he promoted remote mission fields for New Evangelization. He opened new avenues and sent his Adoration sisters to Medinipur and other mission stations.
Archbishop Sirkar never came on the way of creative ministries. He was supportive. He was well grounded at the grassroots. He loved the poor, the downtrodden n those most marginalized in our society.
May his soul rest in peace!