Sr. Mary Mitali of the Associates of Mary Queen of the Apostles, seated, talks to participants during a workshop offered by the Episcopal Commission for the Laity in Bangladesh (Courtesy of Mary Mitali)
Dhaka, Bangladesh Sr. Mary Mitali, a member of the Associates of Mary, Queen of the Apostles, has helped transform thousands of laypeople s lives in her six years providing training through her job as office secretary and trainer with the Episcopal Commission for the Laity.
Before attending training, there was a distance between laypeople and religious priests and nuns, but now, laypeople and religious work closely together, Mitali said. The commission also helps laypeople to be a witness of Christ in this Muslim-majority country, where Christians make up less than 1% of the population of 165 million.
Dhaka, Bangladesh The coronavirus pandemic has meant worsening trouble for nuns and their students across Bangladesh. It is difficult to collect tuition fees from the students. Many of the parents and guardians lost jobs and businesses, and the families are going through financial crisis, Holy Cross Sr. Shikha Laetitia Gomes told Global Sisters Report. Gomes is the principal of Holy Cross College in Dhaka, one of the top colleges in the country for female students. We got tuition fees from 70% of the students. The rest of the students couldn t give it to us.
Although Christians make up less than 1% of the population of this Muslim-majority country, the Catholic Church runs approximately 1,000 schools, 17 colleges and one university. Of those, nuns run around 100 schools, including some colleges. Approximately 80% of the students at these institutions are not Christian.