In the 1970s, an Assumptionist religious, Fr. Mutien Lambert, was leading a Bible study group. Over time he was drawn to the Charismatic Renewal and to its develop-ment in the United States and Europe. The Scripture group gradually became a prayer group in the style of this new movement. Visiting various similar groups outside the country and the arrival of young people to share this new experience led to the formation of a prayer group which took the name Maranatha. Three principal aspects define it: prayer and praise, fraternal life, evangelization.

I was born on July 18, 1988 in "the land of integrity," that is to say, Burkina Faso. I can trace my vocation back to the various organizations I joined at my home parish of Barsalogo: altar servers, vocation awareness group, Christian scouts know as CV-AV… After finishing grammar school, I entered St. Cyprian's minor seminary in the diocese of Kaya in 2001 and later, in 2006, transferred to St. Augustine Seminary in Koupéla. Afterward, as I was doing my humanities at St. Irenaeus Seminary, I discovered the Assumption, which attracted me by the simplicity of life of the religious, their ministry, especially their collaboration with lay people. So it was that I began my postulancy in October 2010  and was accepted to this year's novitiate. I have tried to make my own the prayer of the Dominican priest, Louis-Joseph Lebret, "O God, send us madmen who do more than just speak; who are authentic and are so for a lifetime. We need madmen of today, taken up with a simple life, lovers of peace, untouched by deceit, committed never to betray; mild and strong. O God, send us madmen." I want to be one of these!

Round and round we go in our search,
Looking for God here and there,
In places we know he is not
Through the experience,
Of desperate lives
Here below.

Round and round we go in our search
Through many trials and errors
Forgetting the true place
Ofhis real presence,
In our center:
Our heart.

The carousel of search finally stops,
With no more whirling rounds,
To entrap us in motion.
Our life can be still:
For he is found
In our heart.

By Eugene V. LaPlante, A.A.
December 11, 2011

By Fr. Frans Desmet, AA

It was on December 17, 1991, that Fathers Frans Desmet (South Belgium) and Thierry Cocquerez (France), having taken off from Logan Airport in Boston (USA), arrived at Seoul International Airport where they were welcomed by the local superior of the Missionary Fathers of St. Columban. The following day they were joined by Fr. Leo Brassard (USA) whose plane had been delayed in Los Angeles with technical difficulties. And so it was that the Assumptionists were to set foot once again in the Far East.  For, in fact, they were forced to leave Manchuria in 1954 under pressure from the Communists. Christmas would be celebrated with the Oblate Sisters of the Assumption in Kwangju, a city in the southwest part of the country. It would be there that the community would establish its first community after two years of language study in Seoul.