At 83  years of age, and recently given the all-clear by Sydney specialists after treatment for Leukaemia, Archbishop William Kurtz SVD has headed back to Papua New Guinea to continue his ministry of providing formation for catechists and “helping out” wherever he can.

Archbishop Kurtz, who retired as the Archbishop of Madang in 2010, says he could have returned home to Poland when he retired at 76, but after more than 50 years in PNG, he’d come to love the place and the people, and he wasn’t sure he could cope with the European winters.

The Lay Partners group of the SVD Australia Province joined forces with lay partner groups from around the world recently to take part in a ‘Prayer Bridge’ to mark World Day of the Poor.

The worldwide prayer initiative was an idea conceived by the lay partners of the SVD in Germany and embraced by lay partners and SVD members in a range of countries.

It’s an unassuming building in suburban Melbourne, but Dorish Maru College, has been a powerhouse of missionary formation since it was established 30 years ago.

Dorish Maru College (DMC), the formation house of the Divine Word Missionaries AUS Province, opened its doors in 1988 and since that time has formed and trained hundreds of missionaries who are now serving all around the world.

Fr Nick de Groot SVD has hit the ground running on his new assignment to Our Lady of the Sacred Heart parish in Alice Springs, meeting the people and “soaking up the atmosphere” of the Central Australian community.

The new assignment came as somewhat of a surprise to Fr Nick, who had recently moved to the SVD’s Marsfield community to take up retirement.

I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for Advent – that beautiful time when the Church kicks off a whole new liturgical year with a period of reflection and preparation for the coming of the Christ child at Christmas.

It’s wonderfully counter-cultural to take these weeks of quiet, prayerful preparation when the rest of the world is going mad with parties and shopping and busyness.

This Sunday’s Gospel text always stirs up for me an imaginary charming “family” scene.  Bartimaeus (one of the few people cured by Jesus whose name we know) is having dinner with some of the other disciples of Jesus (we know that after his sight was restored he followed Jesus).

Dear young people, I would like to reflect with you on the mission that we have received from Christ. In speaking to you, I also address all Christians who live out in the Church the adventure of their life as children of God. What leads me to speak to everyone through this conversation with you is the certainty that the Christian faith remains ever young when it is open to the mission that Christ entrusts to us. “Mission revitalizes faith” (Redemptoris Missio, 2), in the words of Saint John Paul II, a Pope who showed such great love and concern for young people.

The Synod to be held in Rome this coming October, the month of the missions, offers us an opportunity to understand more fully, in the light of faith, what the Lord Jesus wants to say to you young people, and, through you, to all Christian communities.

Christians in Indonesia are called to be an interreligious and intercultural people if they are to be “Church-in-Mission”, according to visiting Indonesian theologian and missiologist Fr Raymundus I. Made Sudhiarsa SVD.

Fr Raymundus was visiting the AUS Province recently as guest speaker for the annual Mission Day activities hosted by the Divine Word Missionaries at Yarra Theological Union's Study Centre in Box Hill, Victoria. He also visited Sydney, where he spoke to confreres at Marsfield.

The month of October is always a big one for the SVD community as we take part in the worldwide celebration of World Mission Sunday and all the surrounding events.

This year, Pope Francis addressed his message for World Mission Day to young people, saying he would like to reflect with them “on the mission that we have received from Christ”.

More than 10,000 members of Australia’s Vietnamese Catholic community came together in Sydney recently for a three day festival to celebrate Mary, the Mother of God.

Fr Manh Le SVD, a Vietnamese Chaplain in Sydney, says that the NSW Vietnamese community has celebrated a festival each October, the month of the Rosary, for some years, but this was the first time that Vietnamese chaplaincy communities from right around Australia came together for the days of prayer, faith formation, music and friendship.