The Consolata Seminary in Venezuela is located in the capital city of Caracas. Its four students attend university and live their life of prayer preparing themselves to the best of their strength to become missionary priests, under the guidance of their educator, Father Innocent.
If the situation of their country is bad all over, it is worse in the large towns, like Caracas. People come daily to the door of the Seminary asking for help: children, elderly or those affected by a disease. Food for sale in the shops is scarce, beside being expensive, while drugs are difficult to be found – even in the hospitals.
A program of food distribution for the poorest, that is sponsored by a USA foundation, is active; but what concerns our seminarians, besides the basic needs of the poor who come to their door, is the plight of their peers. With no hope looming on their horizon, young boys and girls are prone to despair and to resort to drinking or drugs. The national government is aware of the problem and in its social plans tries to convince young people not to leave the country and find activities to do where they are. It does so by TV ads and by programs that include sports, summer-camps, social events. However, despite the promises, sports centers, gyms and other community structures are mostly out of use for lack of maintenance.
Our seminarians see young people in the streets around their house idle. There is not much they can do, beside distributing food. However, they think that they could also contribute to improve their well-being and help them to find some sense in their life through music. They would like to offer some thirty young adults a weekend course of music. They need $5,200 to buy two guitars, three flutes, one tuning fork, three violins, one piano and a laptop as well as to offer two meals to their “young musicians” every weekend for a year.
We are aware of the power that music has in lifting up the spirits of human beings, and of the young ones in particular. We are sure that with your contribution we can help Fr. Innocent and his seminarians to offer an alternative to the difficult life of some young people in Venezuela.