On October 17 – 19, 2013, in Cagayan de Oro City took place an Accounting Seminar intended for local treasurers and those interested in financial matters. Here below is a sharing of Fr. Showe Reddy Bala Nekkanti, of one of the participants of this crash course.

“Our manner of administrating and managing our goods should be a witness of evangelical life.”(GD 142)

Our general directory clearly emphasizes the need of transparency and accountability in handling the goods which are at our care.  For this concern, the regional treasurer, Fr. Arthur SCJ with the approval of our superior Fr. Francis SCJ and his council arranged a short seminar on the accountancy.

There were 17 members including Fr. Halim SCJ  from district of Vietnam.

The first day was handled by one of our seminarian, who is also CPA and was working as an Internal Auditor of a private company. His input was more of general accounting and how to make the financial reports. From the second day till fourth day, a team came from the Cagayan de Oro city accounting department headed by Atty. Beda Joy Elot, CPA whose main lecturers were Rhea Suralta CPA, and Rodel Boc, IT specialist. The main topics of these days were journal writing, ledger and double entry.

Though not all of us and not everything was grasped, it was really useful and meaningful seminar. It was difficult to understand and reasons behind. But the whole group attended with full spirit and enthusiasm. First two days were normal but last two days were fun filled days as all of us could enjoy the seminar.

We would like to really express our gratitude for the team of Atty. Bede Joy Elot. It was not easy to teach us and explain to us in common language. And the team really did wonderful job in explaining and helping. We appreciate their patience and generosity. We would also express thanks to Fr. Arthur who worked behind all the preparations and thanks to our superior Fr. Francis and his council for their approval.

As a whole, it was really very different seminar from others. Though sometimes it gave us some headaches, over all we enjoyed a lot while learning about the accounting. I hope this kind of seminars would help and encourage us to learn and know more about administering the goods of the church and the congregation.