January is a time of thanksgiving and celebration for the Society of the Divine Word, as the worldwide community marks the feast days of two of the Society’s founding fathers, St Arnold Janssen and St Joseph Freidemantz.

St Arnold’s feast day is celebrated on January 15, while St Joseph’s is on January 28.

Special masses will be celebrated in SVD communities and parishes around the Australian province on those days and all are welcome to attend.

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 for the missions in 1889.

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.

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