198 His Mission, Our Mission Bishop Joseph of the Udon Thani Diocese presided at Mass and also blessed the new SVD house which has been built in Nong Bua Lamphu, in the North-East of Thailand, as well as a shrine dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary at the parish of St Michael the Archangel. After Mass, the guests stayed on to talk and share local food and watch the children from the Mother of Perpetual Help Centre perform dances from the local Issan culture. Br Damien is the Director of the Centre, which supports adults and children living with AIDS. Looking back over his 50 years of ministry, Br Damien says that he came from a family where religious vocations were plentiful. The religious influence continued when a long-time school friend joined The Divine Word Missionaries at Techny, Illinois as a Brother Candidate, completing his schooling there. “By the time I graduated from high school I became familiar with the brotherhood through him and decided that is what I wanted to be as well,” Br Damien says. “So after high school, in 1960, I entered the SVD at Techny. After taking perpetual vows in 1969, Br Damien received a mission assignment to Goroka in Papua New Guinea where he spent 15 years as financial administrator for the Diocese. Following a four-year return to the Mission Office in Techny, he returned to PNG for another 10 years. A chance conversation with Br James Wilkins alerted Br Damien to the need for volunteers to work in Thailand at an AIDS hospice and after an initial visit to a centre in Bangkok, the Bishop ofUdon Thani Diocese, Bishop George Phimphisan CSsR, invited the SVD to come to his Diocese.
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