CLUB FILIPINO ILLAWARRA, INC. is proud to be part of this global internet Pinoy news, www.mnnetherlands.com, coming from The Netherlands.  And we congratulate you for the courage and determination to start it.

Illawarra is the 3^rd largest city in the state of New South Wales in Australia.  Filipinos here are proud of our achievement in assimilating with the wider community for the last 30 plus years. 

CFI, Inc. was formed in 1995 as a religious organisation first and foremost which is the basis of most of our activities.  With that goal we had incorporated the club as a social, sport, arts & fundraising as well.  For the last 17 years we had the following activities, Novena prayer to Santo Nino every 1^st Friday of the month at 5pm, where His image is enthroned at Saint Francis Xavier Cathedral in Wollongong, donated by  Jose & Fe Bitabara Family. Novena prayers to Santo Nino in people’s houses when requested and 9 consecutive days novena in January prior to a Thanksgiving Mass to Santo Nino at the cathedral and CFI Anniversary celebration at the cathedral hall.

For more than a year now, CFI Chairperson Mir McCauley received a request from the new parish priest, Father David Catterall of Saint Paul Catholic Church in Albion Park who found an image of the Santo Nino.  Father David requested that we pray the novena to Santo Nino like what we have been doing in Wollongong cathedral.  So with more people attending we have been praying as well in Albion Park church every 1^st Saturday of the month at 10:30 am.
 
Father David also requested Mir McCauley with the help of CFI Officers & Members and the wider Filipino community to organise a Filipino Mass in honour of our Lady of the Rosary in October 2011 and another in May this year as a Thanksgiving Mass in honour of Filipino Blessed Pedro Calungsod who will be canonised as the second Filipino Saint sometime in October this year in Vatican, Italy.

The Catholic Diocese of Wollongong for the last several years has organised a yearly mass and celebration for different migrant groups in the Illawarra and Campbelltown headed by Bishop Peter Ingham of Wollongong. CFI had been an active participant of this since its inception here in the Illawarra & Campbelltown area.

Aside from these religious activities; CFI social & cultural activities composed of Yearly AGM & Father’s Day Celebration, Dinner/Dance, Christmas Carolling, Christmas Party, Trips, Picnics, Participating in other ethnic, Filipino, religious and government activities, presenting in a Filipino Mabuhay radio once a month, organised a Filipino language & culture class for several years; organised different sport activities like ten pin bowling, golf, dart, and fishing; for fundraising we had sent a boy through the Phil. Consulate for a 4-year computer course at UST, adopted a girl from Surigao through World Vision her family and community for 12 years and contributed to different appeals for calamities, charities like Cancer Care, House with no Steps,  Catholic Mission, Father Victor Valdez of Conventual Franciscans,  “Smokey Mountains” in Tondo through Father Ben Macajes, the Wollongong Cathedral Migrant Window and many others here in Australia, the Philippines, Africa.

The Management Committee of CLUB FILIPINO ILLAWARRA, INC. for 2011-2012 is:
 
Mir McCauley, Chairperson; Jose Bitabara, Vice Chairperson; Malyn Vasquez, Treasurer; Fe Bitabara, Assistant; Noemi Ognilla, Secretary; Irene Valera, Assistant; Sylvia Pettersson, PRO; Tony Valera, Assistant; Analou Ackroyd, Social & Fundraising ; Cynthia Piccirilli, Arts; Marie Lingal, Sports; Mely Nacilla, Assistant and Keith Edmonson Sr, Public Officer.

 

 

Munting Nayon News Magazine