Cardinal Charles Maung Bo of Yangon in Myanmar reminded bishops over the weekend that one of their tasks is to “make our simple people miracle workers.”
“That is the first task of the bishop,” said the prelate in a homily during the episcopal ordination of Monsignor Maurice Nyunt Wai of the Diocese of Mawlamyine.
Cardinal Bo said bishops should help people “believe in themselves” and “to believe in the living God.”
During the ordination, Cardinal Bo said bishops encounter “many challenges” in their dioceses, especially during times of conflict when people are dispersed and dioceses live through “a long way of the Cross.”
The cardinal said everyone needs healing, and this is where the “miracle of development” is needed. He said people need opportunities for development, and spiritual development must be the main goal.
“Let this human development become the new name for evangelization,” said Cardinal Bo as he apologized to the Diocese of Mawlamyine for “not sharing resources” at the time it was suffering with conflict, poverty, and human trafficking.
“I apologize on behalf of the Yangon diocese, out of which Mawlamyine was divided,” he said, adding that “almost no resources were shared at that time.”
“The human resource was very [minimal]; financial resources were [minimal],” he said.
The cardinal, however, noted that Bishop Raymond Saw Po Ray of Mawlamyine “shepherded the diocese with a large heart, never complaining, always at the forefront of missionary initiatives.”
Cardinal Bo welcomed Bishop Maurice who he called “the new Moses” to the “beautiful road map” of the Mawlamyine diocese.
“The people in Myanmar today want to see an alter Christus in their bishops, someone who resembles Jesus in word and deed,” he said.
“A servant leader is a leader willing to give his life for his people, like the seed that dies to give the best yield,” said the cardinal.
Monsignor Maurice Nyunt Wai, who used to work for the Diocese of Pathein, was named coadjutor bishop of the Diocese of Mawlamyine in the southern part of the country in January.
He was born in the village of Myaungmya in Pathein on Jan. 23, 1962, and attended minor seminary and secondary school in Pathein. He took up his higher studies at the Major Seminary in Yangon.
He was ordained priest on March 11, 1989, and incardinated in the Diocese of Pathein. He took up his doctorate in Theology at the Alphonsian Academy in Rome from 1997 to 2002.
