Catholics from all over the world enjoy first Asian Mission Congress

Published: 2006-10-19

CHIANG MAI, Thailand (CNS) -- Around 1,000 Catholics from all over the world descended on Chiang Mai's misty valley for the first Asian Mission Congress. In the months leading up to the Oct. 18-22 event, more than 1,000 people sent word they would attend the gathering in Thailand's second-largest city. They included more than 70 bishops and cardinals, about 380 priests, nearly 200 men and women religious, and about 400 laypeople, reported UCA News, an Asian church news agency based in Thailand. Nearly half the attendees were from Thailand, and most of the others from two dozen more Asian countries and territories. Three dozen were from Europe and one dozen were from other continents. "We came to Thailand because it is very receptive and very open," Father Mario Saturnino Dias, the congress' overall coordinator, said at the opening-day press conference. The Indian priest is executive secretary of the Office of Evangelization of the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences, which was sponsoring the event with the Vatican's Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

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