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.

The small, remote Indigenous community of Santa Teresa in the desert country of the Northern Territory has rallied together to donate food for the New South Wales town of Glen Innes, which was hit hard by the bushfires before Christmas.

Parish Priest of Santa Teresa, Fr Prakash Menezes SVD says the food collection drive was part of the parish’s Advent sacrifice.

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.

New Year greetings to all. It’s not too late to say that is it? Not if it’s still January, surely. Even though the Christmas-New Year break is well behind us and most of us are back in the swing of work and life.

And what a horrendous Summer break it was for so many Australians this year, as the bushfires raged and lives, homes, businesses and animals were lost. Our prayers are with all those who died and with their loved ones.

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.

Divine Word Missionary students and newly arrived missionaries in the AUS Province have spent part of their summer taking part in an Acculturation Program to help them adjust to life and ministry in Australia.

Entitled ‘Living and Working in the Multicultural Society of Australia’, the program was held at St Leonards in Victoria and included young students from a diverse cultural background, including Vietnam, Ghana, Ecuador, Mexico, China and Thailand.

January is an important month on the Divine Word Missionaries’ calendar, with not one, but two feast days of SVD saints to celebrate.

This year, both St Arnold Janssen (feast day, January 15) and St Joseph Freinademetz (January 29) were remembered with a joint celebration at the St Arnold Janssen Chapel in Marsfield on January 19. Celebrations have also been held in the various different parts of the Province, around Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Myanmar.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John1:14)

God became human and lived among us. What a mind-blowing reality. As I come to the end of my six-year term as Provincial, I have been reflecting in this Advent season on how the missionary must be the incarnation for the people to whom we are sent. We must embody the reality of God-with-us.

Every Gift is an expression of love. It thrills everyone who receives it with no exception, as everyone loves to receive gifts.

Christmas is a very exciting time, for adults and children alike.  It’s a highlight of the year and part of the excitement is the giving and receiving of Gifts and, of course, before you can give, you need to give a thought about what you will give. As Christmas is around the corner, people get busy in preparations for the celebrations and family reunions; shopping, decorations, preparing eatables, and so on.