Hong Kong, PRC. In an online meeting held Tuesday, July 7, 2020, by the different heads of the various publishing houses in the Congregation, members of the Claret Publishing Group (CPG), the Claretian publishing houses of Tanzania, Philippines, and Northeast India reported the publication of the 35-year-old Claretian Project “Bible Diary” into new languages. The Bible Diary is now published in 25 languages! It finds new frontiers in Africa and Asia.
The meeting, participated by twenty-four heads and representatives of the different publishing houses all over the world, is an unprecedented attempt to make up for the loss of the regular Frankfurt meeting. The participants shared their joy in this new venture of doing online meetings of the Claretian publishing houses across the continents.
Fr. Rossa Alberto, CPG President and senior-most Claretian involved in the publishing ministry, opened the meeting. Father General, Mathew Vattamattam, CMF, who also joined them, in his opening remarks reminded the participants that the publication ministry is a patrimony of the Congregation as it has been a project that our Father Founder himself pursued.
During the meeting, although everyone mentioned how the Covid-19 crisis had affected the publication ministry as a whole, the body was glad that nobody had closed their bookstore.
Moreover, the coordinators of the digitalization project, Fr. Jijo Kandamkulathy (East Asia Delegation), Nelson Thomas Puthenparambil, and Manoj Kandathinkara, CMFF (Bangalore Province), related to the body the updates of the project.
After sharing the past, present, and future of the ministry in each publishing house, Fr. Henry Omonisaye, CMF, General Consultor, and animator of the group, summed up the common factors that came out of the sharing and reminded them that digitization is a necessary transition that we need to make in the ministry. He reiterated the need for archiving and quoted his discussion on the subject in the General Government. He also reminded them that this is a way to guard the intellectual property and heritage of the Congregation.
