By Thomas Scaria
Bengaluru, June 25, 2024: Catholic parents of some intellectually disabled children in Bengaluru got a boost with the Claretians offering support to an exclusive housing project for their community living.
“Since four years, we have been dreaming of this project as we were really worried about our disabled children’s future after our death,” Merly Thomas, one of the parents, told a June 23 meeting at Claretian Seminary in the southern Indian city.
Merly, a member of the Bangalore Archdiocesan commission for differently abled,
says the Claretian support now helps them build the common living facility where children with intellectual disabilities and their parents can live with dignity.
Claretian Father George Kannanthanam, who brought his congregation to the project, says he had seen parents of many differently able children worried about what would happen to their children when they are no more.
The priest impressed upon his provincial to allot two acres of land for such families at Gauribidanur, on the outskirts of Bengaluru city.
Kannanthanam, who had earlier served as the first secretary to the Bangalore diocesan commission for the disabled, said the Hope Society that functions under the Claretians will give wings to the project.
The Archdiocese of Bangalore was first in India to set up a commission to ensure better participation of persons with disabilities in the life of the Church, he recalled.
He said once the land allotment process is completed adjacent to their Project Vision campus, the beneficiary families will make the necessary investment to create the facilities, under the guidance of the Claretians.
The priest, who also serves as the core team member of “Engage Disability,” a national movement of all Churches to foster inclusiveness of families with disability, said once completed, the project will be a unique model of “self help and mutual help” among such families.
Joshy and Bessy, a young couple whose son is intellectually disabled, say the most harrowing question staring at them is the fate of their child after them.
The couple approached the Claretians with this question during the pandemic time that led to the formation of a support group among such parents, leading to the idea of developing an exclusive living facility.
Merly says their children are raised in the Catholic faith. “It is their steadfast faith that often sustains the parents,” added the woman, who visualizes the project as an exclusive Catholic living community that cares and shares.
“We want them to continue to live under the guidance and protection of the Church, nourished by the holy Sacraments,” she told Matters India while thanking the Claretian congregation for offering the space.
Intellectual disability affects about 3 percent of India’s population. Seventy-five to ninety percent of the affected people have mild intellectual disability.
Father Mario Zalki, the director of the Project Vision campus in Gauribidanur, said his congregation is committed to the cause of disabled children through the Project Vision started in 2013 with an eye donation movement.
The Project Vision Rural Campus reaches out to 300 children with disabilities in Tumkur and Chikkaballapur districts through various programs for education and livelihood
It also has a day center for 25 children with various disabilities. The intellectually disabled children project will come up adjacent to project vision.
“The specialty of the project is that the parents need not worry about what happens to their children if they die. The community will continue to take care of them under this program,” Father Zalki said.
“Our motto is, Do what is Urgent, Timely and Effective, and we are inspired by this in our services to society,” he added.
Father Kannanthanam says the project envisages a vibrant self-reliant, self-sustaining community where the young adults and their senior parents live with dignity, each contributing to the daily activities with enthusiasm,” he told Matters India.
He says when parents live with the children, the center becomes an inclusive and secure community where they can live independently in their Catholic faith.
“This project will be run as a partnership between the Claretian congregation and the parents association, which will be constituted in the form of a trust or society,” Father Kannanthanam explained.
He said the proposed project will have modern amenities with independent villas, apartments, day care centers which will be limited to a maximum 50 Catholic families.