MIRROR News – Issue October/November 2018

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No 7 • October/November 2018 Published eight times per year

www.acnmalta.org

“For this spiritual combat, we can count on the powerful weapons the Lord has given us: faith-filled prayer, the celebration of Mass, Eucharistic adoration, sacramental Reconciliation, works of charity, missionary outreach.”

Pope Francis, Apostolic Exhortation Gaudete et Exsultate

“Behold, the Lamb of God” – the Holy Sacrifice: Archbishop Kaigama, Nigeria.

The month of October is dedicated to the Universal Mission of the Church – but it is also the month of the Holy Rosary. At first glance the two might seem largely unrelated, but in reality they are inseparable.

Every Catholic mission depends entirely on prayer, and prayer inspires those who pray to proclaim the Gospel to all mankind.

The world today is increasingly ruled by ideologies. We are engaged in a spiritual battle. At stake is the authority to interpret the nature of this world; the spirit that will govern our lives and that of our countries. That is why we so greatly need prayer and a worldwide mission, so that the true spirit may prevail through them. Before Jesus sent out his disciples to proclaim the Gospel, he gave them authority to cast out unclean spirits (Mark 6:7). They were to “exorcise” the world, so to speak, so that people’s hearts could be free to embrace the new spirit. The founder of ACN, Father Werenfried van Straaten, himself saw clearly, right from the beginning, that the task of materially helping the needy and persecuted also spiritually uplifts the giver,

perhaps even saving him or her from the sin of pride and moral decay. Our compassion for the world’s poor wrenches forces us out of our indifference, impelling us to perform gestures of love and uplifting our Christian spirit.

As we have all experienced, the resolve to be faithful to prayer and act in a missionary spirit is always accompanied by a spiritual

others’ freedom to proclaim with joy a Good News which one has come to know through the Lord’s mercy? And why should only falsehood and error, debasement and pornography have the right to be put before people and often unfortunately imposed on them by the destructive propaganda of the mass media, by the tolerance of legislation, the timidity of the good and the impudence of the wicked?”

“We greatly need prayer and a worldwide mission, so that the true spirit may prevail through them.” struggle. The devil wants to deprive us of this inner resolve, this apostolic zeal and courage. As Blessed Pope Paul VI writes in Evangelii Nuntiandi, “The lack of fervour is all the more serious because it comes from within. It is manifested in fatigue, disenchantment, compromise, lack of interest and above all lack of joy and hope.” By contrast, our commitment to God’s will brushes aside all excuses and objections, including those that see evangelisation as a violation of our personal freedom. Pope Paul VI rightly asks: “Is it then a crime against

Let us then be zealous in praying the Rosary, dear friends, so that through Mary, the first missionary, the true spirit that brings peace to the world may prevail within us. Let us help the missionaries on the front line, through our prayers and acts of love, that they may not be influenced by the false spirit or tempted to proclaim their own ideas, but instead preach only the “greatest and oldest idea”: namely Christ.

My grateful blessing on you all,

Fr Martin Maria Barta Ecclesiastical Assistant 1

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ipends Mass St

Set free to proclaim the truth: Holy Mass celebrated for our benefactors’ intentions.

Subsistence aid for us all...

A Mass stipend, or Mass offering, is a gift of money to a priest, in return for which he agrees to celebrate Holy Mass for a particular intention of the donor. The grace of the Sacrament cannot be “bought” in this way, but the stipend does bind the giver more intimately with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. This custom dates back to the second century. The acceptance, administration and application of Mass stipends is governed by canons 945 – 958 of the Code of Canon Law. The diocesan bishop is responsible for overseeing their observance.

ACN has been passing on our benefactor’s Mass offerings for more than 50 years now, in almost every country of the world, but particularly in those where Christ, in the person of his priests, once more treads the path to Golgotha. In many of the poorest and most antiChristian countries your Mass offerings are, for many priests, the sole means of survival.

Another reason, suggested to us by Bishop Philippe Nkiere Kena of the Diocese of Inongo in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, is that they are a source of spiritual and

The real encounter with Christ: Holy Mass in Odessa, celebrated for the intentions of an ACN benefactor.

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psychological stability for priests carrying out their mission. As, in a country which is at the mercy of murderous gangs, where corruption undermines the law, where strange sects and ancient superstitions are leading so many Christians astray and where polygamy and moral breakdown have become part of daily life, it is extremely difficult for Catholic priests to preach against these evils and draw people back to God and the truth. Especially when the priests are dependent on the offerings of these same Catholic faithful. Your Mass

More time to devote to his parishioners: one fruit of your “subsistence aid”.

offerings allow them a degree of independence and stability, so that they can devote themselves still more single-mindedly to their people. Besides, the economy here, in the second largest diocese of the country, has essentially collapsed to subsistence level, so that, without Mass stipends, most of the 109 priests working in the diocese would have to be constantly seeking work and money, simply to survive. We are helping, with 2,400 Mass offerings for the year. That is 2,400 encounters with Christ.

In the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Exarchate of Odessa we have passed on 1000 Mass stipends to 43 priests. Again, it is not only the priests you are supporting here but all their pastoral work and the diocese’s three-year missionary programme. Already this is beginning to bear fruit, as the parishes become more lively, more active and above all involve the young people more. They have held five summer camps and six missions, and the numerous retreat days are fully booked. Your Mass stipends have enabled priests to engage in these pastoral activities. So you are helping them to bring people to God. As the great Doctor of the Church, Saint John of the Cross said, “However much men may seek after God, God seeks Man still more.” We cannot be closer to God than in the Eucharist. This is the place of true encounter. It is our priests who make this encounter possible and hence, when we speak of these Mass offerings as a form of “subsistence aid”, the term has a particular spiritual depth. For in essence it is “subsistence aid” for us all.

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Mission

Taking their faith seriously: youth missionaries in Brazil preparing for their mission.

The joy of faith in Papua New Guinea: the colourful face of inculturation.

Young missionaries The Church is young, as Pope Saint John Paul II said, when he first launched the World Youth Days. His successors are continuing this new tradition, and in October the first ever Synod on Youth will be held.

The Youth are our future. There are some 150,000 young people in the diocese of Santissima Conceição do Araguaia in the Amazon region of Brazil, but very few priests to minister to their spiritual needs.

And still fewer who can also speak to them in their own language and understand their particular needs and problems. That is why, for over 10 years now, the diocese has been training up lay youth missionaries

who can convey Christian teachings and values to their contemporaries. After a sixweek intensive training course, these young missionaries promise to serve the diocese for a full year. They visit the villages, schools, and parishes and go out to the margins. The main theme this year is education for peace and overcoming violence.

But this mission costs money – for food, transport, lodging and teaching materials.

For the eight youth missionaries it comes to €9,768. A small price to pay, given that the witness of these young people will continue afterwards in their daily lives. “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34).

Similarly, in Papua New Guinea, young people in the Diocese of Alotau-Sideia are taking on leadership roles in parish youth outreach. In special workshops they are, for example, learning about inculturation and about the Theology of the Body – and how our bodies are gifts from God – and how to use social networking for evangelisation.

The youngsters pay for their training in kind – in fish and fruit – for they have nothing else. We are supplying the remaining €6,000 which is needed.

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“Future dreams for seminarians” In the diocese of Yendi in Ghana four seminarians are preparing for ordination.

All four have their own dreams about their future life with the Lord.

“My first dream is ordination itself”, says Elijah Nakobah. “Nothing is going to stop me now.” After that, he wants to be among his people, bringing them the Sacraments.

He also wants to help them with their livestock rearing, to speak to them in their own language, bring communion to the sick and elderly and “if possible, also go into the prisons. For they are God’s children too”.

Justice Gmabagnan dreams of keeping bees, alongside his pastoral duties. Then there will be a little honey also for the people of God. Joseph Nweyada is filled with lar

the desire “to discern the will of God and follow this as the guiding star of my life”.

And he wants to convey this desire to other young people as well, through good catechesis and good example. For as he says, “a good and healthy piety strengthens the whole Church”. As for Joseph Megbenya, his modest dream, after the years of study and learning, is “to go out to the people and open their hearts to Christ”. For Joseph this will start with a year of pastoral work.

This poor, rural diocese, with its dry, semiarid landscape, is setting great hopes in its

projects, and enable the pastoral work of Aid to the Church in Need.

Soon it will be out of the seminary and into the bush, or wherever God leads.

This is Joseph, one of the four seminarians.

four seminarians. Given the large distances, they will each need a moped for their pastoral work. That is the diocese’s dream. A dream that will cost €6,000. A dream that we hope to fulfil.

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in In Mission

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The price of the grain of wheat They called him Bhalu, the bear. It was their affectionate nickname in the Hindi language for the powerful figure of Father Herman Rasschaert SJ, who died a martyr.

Whenever Father Herman appeared, people tended to fall silent. The same thing happened to a mob of enraged Hindus, when this imposing Jesuit priest in his white habit and black beard stepped forward and stood on the low wall surrounding the mosque in Gerda, in which hundreds of Muslims had taken shelter. Father Herman knew that a fanatical mob was not going to be appeased by a sermon. So he merely shouted out: “Killing people is a grave sin. Stop this evil!

Stop! Stop!” They were his last words. For a moment the crowd fell silent, then suddenly someone shouted, “He is one of them!” A stone the size of a fist flew through the air and struck Father Herman in the face. He fell to the ground, tried to rise, but then the bloodthirsty horde was upon him, stabbing him repeatedly, trampling over him and rushing into the mosque. It was 24 March 1964, on Tuesday of Holy Week. Over 1000 people died in the massacre that day.

Father Herman was just 42. But he did not die in vain. News spread rapidly of the heroic sacrifice of this Jesuit priest from Flanders in defending the Muslim minority in the southern Jharkhand region of northeast India. The central government sent troops and brought the unrest in the province under control. In

The site of the new church. The small chapel in the background has long since become too small for the growing number of pilgrims.

Local Bishop Vincent Barwa of Simdega at Father Herman’s tomb in Gerda.

An example for the young: Father Herman’s sacrifice still inspires them today.

a radio message which was broadcast throughout the country, the interior minister paid tribute to “the highest sacrifice a man can make for the sake of brotherly peace and friendship for all”. Prime Minister Nehru and Indira Gandhi both paid public tribute to Father Herman.

faithfulness and perseverance can bring happiness to others, how selfless love brings peace. “Bhalu” gave of himself unstintingly – for his pupils, his parish, for all his people – even giving his own life.

The blood of the martyrs can also be the seed of peace. Mission is not just about preaching and teaching, but also about the example of our lives. Father Herman taught people, by his example of work and prayer, how the Christian life can lighten the burden of our everyday cares, how kindness,

Near the place of his Golgotha a new church will be built. The existing small chapel has long since become too small to accommodate the pilgrims who, in recent decades, have come to Gerda in growing numbers to pray at the tomb of this martyr. At present they are ministered to by two priests and three Ursuline nuns. Although the people of the parish are poor, and modern services and facilities rare (e.g. electricity and properly surfaced roads), they are willing to put up one fifth of the cost of the new church.

The remaining four fifths – a total of €38,830 – will come from ACN, they hope.

And we have promised to help.

The Christians of Gerda live from the fruit of the soil. Father Herman, who once wanted to be a farmer, especially loved the phrase from St John’s Gospel: “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth… but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” (Jn 12:24). He was that grain. If each of us now gives the price of a handful of wheat, then the mission in India will surely yield a rich harvest.

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Syria

The bond of love

Christ, Light of the nations and light of these Syrian Christians at the Easter Vigil.

“This is my body, which will be given up for you.” There are few places on earth today where they are living the Passion of Our Lord more than in Syria.

Those who could escape, did so. Over half the Syrian people were made exiles, or refugees in their own land. Those who remained now live in hunger among the ruins.

The priests stayed on – in Homs, Hama, Aleppo and the other ruined cities. Their presence gives courage to the Christians, for now, more than ever the Church embodies

“For on the night when he was betrayed...”: Holy Mass in Hama, Syria, for ACN’s benefactors. lar

their hopes. The priests convey this hope by both word and deed. Living on just 110 dollars a month, priests still manage to give to the poor and sick. Their witness strengthens others. But where does their strength come from? From their encounter with Christ. “It is from the midst of suffering that the message of salvation springs”, says Archbishop Samir Nassar, of the Maronite Diocese of Damascus. Yet the temptation to leave is always there, ever present, he adds. Baptisms and weddings are down by 75%, whereas funerals are an everyday occurrence. “But the future of the Church in Syria rests, as it does everywhere, on the priesthood. What would happen to the Church without priests?” And in this difficult situation the Archbishop welcomes ACN’s Mass stipends as a revitalising breath of fresh air.

We have promised him €4,320 in Mass offerings for his 9 priests, and to Melkite Catholic Archbishop Jean Abdo Arbach of Homs, Hama and Yabroud we are giving €14,400 for his 18 priests. “Peace be with you” says Archbishop Arbach, adding, “Your help nourishes our hope”. And Maronite

projects, and enable the pastoral work of Aid to the Church in Need.

Children in Syria receiving Holy Communion from Melkite Patriarch Emeritus Gregorios III. Bishop Antoine Chbeir of Latakia, quotes Saint Paul in asking for Masses for his 30 priests (we have promised him €24,000).

“We preach Christ crucified”, Bishop Chbeir says adding “the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:23ff).

He is referring to the sufferings of the Syrian Christians today – and to the bond of love that unites us to them.

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The Rosary – a worldwide bond of love It began 12 years ago. A small group of children gathered beneath a tree in Venezuela and prayed. The children, not quite 10 years old, were praying the Rosary – for peace, for their families, for the world. But they didn’t want to pray alone. Other children joined them. They wanted one million children to pray the Rosary together at the same time – all around the world. Now it happens every year. On 18 October hundreds of thousands of children pray the Rosary, in a campaign that unites the world with God. For the Rosary, as Saint John Paul II wrote, “brings us through the heart of his Mother into a living bond with Jesus”. Once again this year ACN is calling on children all over the world to pray, through the intercession of the Mother of God, for peace – above all in Iraq and Syria. The prayer of children is powerful. But organising the campaign in so many different languages costs money. So we are also turning to the grown-ups for their help – so that still more children may come to hear of this bond of love that binds the world together, and join in.

Need, love and thanks − your letters A little task for the Lord This is the first time that I have written to you – as until recently I knew practically nothing about your organisation. But yesterday I was in Fatima, and after Holy Mass I found a copy of the Mirror left lying on a bench. It seemed to be waiting just for me.

Being somewhat curious about such things, I felt the Lord was calling me and giving me a little task to do: take a little flour from your store and give it for this good cause. So this is what I have done!

A benefactress in Portugal How can anyone say “no”?

Your letters and Mirror are so compassionate and compelling, so poignant and bracing, that one wonders how anyone can say “no” to your urgent pleas. The love of Christ urges us, does it not? Thank you for allowing us to be a small part in your extraordinary

work on behalf of our Brothers and Sisters of the Household of Faith! ...

Finally, as for the issues of the Mirror, I save each of them. They are a wonderful compendium of Faith and Truth and Love!

Thank you, again!

A benefactor in the United States An offering given in gratitude Please find enclosed a donation of $70 – towards religious Sisters and wherever you feel it is needed. I give thanks to God that I am finally permanent in my job as an Aged Care Worker and have the security to support my family. In gratitude I offer you this donation and pray that you continue this good work. I am sure that Fr Werenfried would be so proud of all you have achieved. Please keep up the good work.

And I enjoy receiving the Mirror regularly.

A benefactress in Australia

Thomas Heine-Geldern, Executive President, ACN (International)

Dear Friends,

Whenever I have the opportunity to talk about Mass stipends, I feel a sense of joy and wonder at being able to report that every 21 seconds Holy Mass is celebrated somewhere in the world for the intentions of one of our benefactors. Not only does this confidence in the power of the Holy Eucharist strengthen the faith of the giver, but it is also an important pillar supporting the bridge of love that unites us to our suffering brothers and sisters. At the same time it enables many priests not only to carry out their own pastoral ministry, but also to materially support their communities – which are often extremely poor.

I would like to thank you all for persevering with your prayers and generosity, because these Mass offerings enable us to light many torches of faith and hope which can be passed on to future generations. It is this coming generation that particularly concerns us as we grow older, filling us with both joy and concern for the future. Let us therefore join together in praying for the forthcoming Youth Synod in October, so that, with courage and with the help of the Holy Spirit, ways may be found to inspire young people with love for Jesus Christ.

Editors: Jürgen Liminski & Stephen Axisa Please use the envelope. Aid to the Church in Need, 39B Mdina Road, Publisher: Aid to the Church in Need, 39B Mdina Road, Attard ATD 9038 Attard ATD 9038; Tel: 21487818; Fax: 21586257 APS Bank, IBAN: MT72 APSB 7705 7008 5772 2000 1771 733 Printed in Malta BIC: APSBMTMT De licentia competentis auctoritatis Email: info@acnmalta.org – facebook//Aid to the Church in Need Malta ecclesiasticae Pass this leaflet on to your neighbours, friends or leave it at the Parish www.acnmalta.org Church for others to review.

Where to send your contribution for the Church in Need

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