The Gospel reading of today speaks of the transfiguration of the Lord. Jesus’ appearance changed on the high mountain: his face shone like the sun and his clothes became dazzling white.

The call to be born again during Lent is all about our willingness and openness to recognise the goodness, the giftedness, the God and Jesus presence in the minds and hearts of our neighbour, writes Fr Michael Knight SVD.

During Lent then we are all called to die to our old selves so that a new self and a new community can be born.

SVD missionary students spread out from Dorish Maru College in Melbourne over the summer months to take up pastoral placements in different Divine Word Missionary communities around Australia.

Some enjoyed the experience of suburban parish life, while others immersed themselves in Indigenous culture in Central Australia, or joined in ministry at the Janssen Spirituality Centre in Victoria.

The SVD AUS Province’s newest mission in Myanmar is continuing to unfold, as the missionaries get to the know the people, the language and the place.

The Divine Word Missionaries have been on the ground in Myanmar for almost two years now, following an invitation from Cardinal Charles Bo SDB to establish a Bible ministry in his Archdiocese of Yangon.

Luis Robles from Ecuador has been engaged in mission work since he was 15 years old, and now, as a Divine Word Missionary student, he is spending time in the SVD AUS Province, opening himself up to a different culture and experience.

Luis, aged 26, is in Australia as part of the SVD’s Overseas Training Program (OTP) and says he is enjoying everything he does and “trying to make memories”.

Divine Word Missionaries in leadership positions throughout the AUS Province came together recently for a workshop to explore the role of leadership in a mission context and to share their experiences.

The workshop was held at the SVD provincial offices in Marsfield, Sydney, and included confreres from right across the province – Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Myanmar.

As you receive this edition of In the Word, we have just entered into the season of Lent, a time which calls us especially to look at how we can become closer to God and to our neighbour.

This is an important time of reflection and action for all Christians – a time of taking spiritual stock – and for us, as Divine Word Missionaries, it is a time to dig deep and consider afresh how we are meeting the needs of those we are called to accompany and serve.

When I was in my first year in the seminary, our Religious Education teacher challenged us to see who knew the Ten Commandments and who could recite them.

If you are like me and use the Internet and social media on a regular basis, sometimes we’re just amazed at how Google is so accurate at predicting what it is that we are trying to search for as we are in the process of typing the intended keywords. It’s like Google can read your mind! We’re also quite equally amazed at how the content that appears on our Facebook Newsfeed, even the advertisements seem to match quite well our interests and needs. We are also impressed at how Amazon manages to suggest books that we might like (and indeed would like) to read based on other books that we have read in the past.

Whether it’s Google, Facebook, or Amazon, the use of artificial intelligence (AI) based algorithms by these and other technology companies providing services that help us connect with people, provide us with news and entertainment, and bring to us various advertisements which are all personalised—based on the data that these algorithms collect and process from our use of their (usually) free services.

The SVD AUS Province is supporting national efforts to raise funds for bushfire relief, with parishes, lay partners and confreres all contributing to the cause.

Provincial, Fr Asaeli Rass SVD, says the parishes in the Province were supporting the St Vincent de Paul Bushfire Relief Appeal through the Australia Day parish collection, as requested by Australia’s bishops and Catholic Religious Australia (CRA), and the Province was also considering any other ways  it might be able to help people get back on their feet.