By EAO Missionary Animation Team

During the 155th Salesian Missionary Expedition last September 29, 2024, our EAO region sent 6 missionaries. After presenting the two from VIE Province, one from the FIN Province we present the second of the 3 from the TLS Vice Province.

I am Cl. Francisco Armindo Viana. My parents are farmers. I am the second of nine children. I come from a simple family, but rich in the values of the faith. I came to know Don Bosco through the Oratory of the FMA Sisters in Marco, Cailaco. With the help of the Sisters, I was able to study at the Don Bosco Technical Secondary School in Maumali-Maliana. There I decided to become a Salesian because the joy, optimism and dedication of Salesian missionaries were a powerful invitation for me to become like them. I look at the missionaries I met in my country like Fr. Elígio Locatelli, Dc. Balthazar Pires and Fr. Manuel Fraile are my models and inspirations.

Later, with the help and support of the postnovitiate formators, I decided to apply to be a Salesian missionary to continue carrying the love of God that I have received throughout my life to the mission land. I was very happy when I heard that the Rector Major and his Council had accepted me as a member of the 155th Missionary Expedition. I felt a sense of gratitude to God and I placed myself in His hands saying: “Here I am Lord sent me”!

I welcomed the news that the Rector Major is sending me to the newly established Vice-Province of Mary Help of Christians (ACC) composed of the two countries of the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo (or Congo Brazzaville).

My family, friends and Salesian confreres are mostly happy and satisfied with my missionary vocation. Although some find it difficult to accept God’s call to me to be a missionary outside my own country.

---

---