SVD communities around the AUS Province celebrated their heritage in January with the feast days of the Divine Word Missionaries founder, St Arnold Janssen, and the first SVD to be sent out on mission, St Joseph Freinademetz.

St Arnold’s feast day is celebrated on January 15, while St Joseph’s is on January 28.
Each community celebrated the feast days in different ways, with the celebration of the Eucharist uniting all in prayer and thanksgiving.

Rector of the Marsfield community in Sydney, Fr Viet Nguyen SVD, says confreres spent St Arnold’s feast day in recollection and later celebrated with SSpS Sisters and friends.

“Very fittingly, we had silence till the end of the afternoon Eucharist,” says Fr Viet. “The evening brought a huge crowd of visitors.”

St Arnold Janssen, a German priest, founded the Society of the Divine Word in 1875 in a mission house in Steyl, Holland. The society was designed to provide priests and lay brothers for the missions. He also founded the Servant Sisters of the Holy Spirit (SSpS) for the missions in 1889, and a contemplative order, the Sister Servants of the Holy Spirit of Perpetual Adoration.

St Arnold was passionate about the Word of God and wanted everyone, in all corners of the globe, to know the Word and to know Jesus Christ.

He once said: “To proclaim the Good News is the first and greatest act of love of neighbour”.

St Joseph Freinademetz was also a German priest who became one of the first two SVD missionaries. He set out for China on March 2, 1879 and devoted his life to missionary work. Despite facing many difficulties in China, he came to really know and love the people there and stayed among them until his death.

Today, the Society of the Divine Word, has more than 6000 missionaries serving every continent on earth.

Both Fr Arnold and Fr Joseph were canonised by Pope John Paul II on October 5, 2003.

Read more about the life of St Arnold here.
Read more about the life of St Joseph here.

Read Fr Frank Gerry SVD's homily on St Arnold here.