SVD confreres joined with Holy Spirit Sisters, lay partners and staff earlier this month to celebrate Foundation Day at the Marsfield community in Sydney.

The day, on the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, marked the 144th anniversary of the founding of the Divine Word Missionaries by St Arnold Janssen in Steyl, Holland, in 1875, and was celebrated at SVD communities throughout the AUS Province and around the world.

As you receive this edition of In the Word in your inbox, we are preparing, with the rest of the Church, to respond to Pope Francis’ invitation to celebrate an Extraordinary Mission Month throughout October.

This coincides with the annual celebration of World Mission Sunday on October 20, but Pope Francis has called us to an even more active awareness and promotion of mission this year to commemorate the centenary of Pope Benedict XV’s Apostolic Letter Maximum Ilud, published in November 1919.

Bless every father and grandfather with the best of your spiritual blessings today.

While at Sydney University in the late sixties, I belonged to the Catholic Bushwalking Club. Groups of us would go for day walks and weekend camping in the Blue Mountains, this being a well-known mountain range west of Sydney. There were a number of Columban Missionary priests who were also present on these different walks and camping weekends.

When I finished my studies in Geology, I applied and was accepted to work for a mining company in Queensland. However at the same time that career seemed less and less appealing. One time when I was on a Bushwalking camping trip I experienced a calling to follow Jesus as a priest.

The St Arnold Janssen Chapel and the Marsfield community grounds were a kaleidoscope of colour and multicultural prayer, song, dance and food recently for the annual Multicultural Sunday celebrations.

Friends of the SVD from various ethnic chaplaincy groups, Bible groups, breakfast groups and communities who worship at the chapel in Marsfield came together in national dress under the theme of ‘Being Neighbour’.

In the SVD Australian Province, attempts at being prophetic about Christ present in the people who have been pushed aside have taken various forms over the years. Prophetic indeed, when Divine Word Missionaries are trying to recognise the face of Christ in caring for asylum seekers and refugees (Melbourne & Bangkok), advocating for people living with AIDS (Thailand), ongoing support for the plight of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders (Central Australia) and constantly raising funds to assist the many needed projects around the world (AUS Mission Office and MissionNZ).

Many have also dared to reach out in friendship to people at CANA communities in Sydney, who are suffering from loneliness, mental illness and addictions. The Missionaries also work in faith communities in more than 60 countries, with people of all faiths and none.

After nearly a decade holding the purse-strings of the SVD across the world, Fr Stephan Gerdes SVD has arrived in the AUS Province, ready for God to reveal his new mission assignment.

Fr Stephan, who was born and raised in Germany, has been Treasurer-General of the Society of the Divine Word, based in Rome since 2010 and before that was a missionary to Papua New Guinea.

The SVD Lay Partners group in Marsfield is continuing its journey of growth and formation in SVD life and spirituality, with a recent presentation on the life of founder, St Arnold Janssen.

The presentation was delivered by Fr Frank Gerry SVD, who has rich experience in SVD formation, and Fr Dom Flores SVD, who is accompanying the Lay Partners group.

It’s a long way from Fr Prakash Menezes SVD’s home in India to his parish of Santa Teresa in the Central Australian desert country, but it is exactly the kind of Christ-led and people-centred life he hoped for when he signed up to be a missionary priest.

Fr Prakash joined the Divine Word Missionaries in India and undertook his theological studies and formation in Melbourne, where he made his final vows and was ordained to the priesthood in 2014.

Terry Davies (SVD Marburg class of 1969-70) organized a wonderful 50th anniversary gathering at the former SVD seminary, Marburg, Queensland, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Moon Landing. Unfortunately, Terry himself landed in hospital just before the ‘touch-down’ and was unable to join us – but he is on the mend! Terry worked on this project for several years, tracing as many former SVD students as he could, and resulting in a gathering of 19 men, on the 20-21 July 2019.

A very special guest was Fr Frank Gerry SVD, who had been novice master to many of those present. Particular tribute was paid to Frank for his role in awakening us to our potential to be the best we could be, in the SVD tradition, each in our own different way. Many of us had spent much of our working lives in the helping professions, especially in social action and social justice activities, often with a connection to Australia’s indigenous people.