The academic year is getting underway at the SVD formation house, Dorish Maru College, in Melbourne, with five new young missionaries from Vietnam, Ghana and Mexico joining the multicultural student mix as they take up language and theological studies.

Dorish Maru College is home to students from various countries who have come to the AUS Province to complete their formation and education as Divine Word Missionaries.

The year has begun in typical fast-paced fashion for us all, and we are just about to leave summer behind in most of the AUS Province and head into Autumn.

I quite like the fact that here in the south, Lent normally takes place in Autumn – a time when we see the leaves start to fall from the trees and we ponder the fact that they will return to the earth, from where they came.

The year has begun in typical fast-paced fashion for us all, and we are just about to leave summer behind in most of the AUS Province and head into Autumn.

I quite like the fact that here in the south, Lent normally takes place in Autumn – a time when we see the leaves start to fall from the trees and we ponder the fact that they will return to the earth, from where they came.

AUS Provincial, Fr Henry Adler SVD, attended the recent Papua New Guinea Provincial Chapter meeting, as part of a new push to promote closer collaboration among SVD zones and sub-zones in the Asia-Pacific.

The PNG Province, which has a long and warm association with the AUS Province, took as its theme for the gathering, “Witnessing the Joy of the Gospel through Intercultural Living”.

The annual SVD Marsfield Community Carols by Candlelight was a wonderful celebration again this year, featuring choirs and performers from a broad range of ethnic communities.

The multicultural flavour of the evening was topped off when everyone came together to sing Silent Night, with verses in different languages as well as in English. And there was even a visit from Santa for the kids.

The Divine Word Missionaries were in the midst of it when more than 3000 young people from dioceses all over Australia celebrated the Australian Catholic Youth Festival in Adelaide this month.

Fr Elmer Ibarra, the SVD Vocations Director, together with Hy Nguyen SVD, a young OTP student in the AUS Province, ‘hung out’ at the Divine Word Missionaries stall at the Festival’s Expo, and shared information and insights about SVD life with visitors to the stall.

Young people from St Mark’s Parish, Inala, in collaboration with the youth groups from Darra–Jindalee parish and Acacia Ridge parish, came together recently to celebrate the G1 youth event – God First.

Around 100 young people gathered in the Mercy Hall at lunch time on Sunday, November 29, for praise, worship and adoration and to hear two different testimonies about life changing moments in life after encountering God.

Christmas is special for so many reasons. It is a time for family and friends, for gift-giving, for church-going, for eating, and, perhaps by the late afternoon, even for napping. As a European, I love the relaxed and laid back atmosphere of the Aussie Christmas, which is more likely to feature a game of beach cricket than the snow men of my youth.

But even as we appreciate all that Christmas is to us, let us try to never forget that Christmas is truly special because it recalls the fact that a little over 2000 years ago, God chose to come and dwell with us, in the person of Jesus Christ.

SVD missionaries ministering in places as far-flung as rural Central Queensland, suburban Brisbane and fast-growing Logan City, gathered together recently for a Queensland District Assembly.

The Assembly, which was held at the same time as the official Provincial Visitation, was a time for the confreres to get together for support, fellowship and ongoing formation.

In situations where there are a variety of rich religious traditions, interreligious dialogue will be the main form of evangelisation and may be the only way to exercise mission, says the General Mission Secretary of the Divine Word Missionaries, Fr Lazar Stanislaus SVD.

Fr Lazar, who was in Australia recently for the International Mission Symposium, says the link between interreligious dialogue and mission can be found in the wisdom of the Second Vatican Council.