ACKNOWLEDGING DENIS UHR MSC, 80

Denis Uhr turns 80 on April 19^th.

Denis did his secondary studies at Downlands College. He made his novitiate in 1958, professing first vows on February 26^th, 1959.

His studies were at Sacred Heart Monastery, Croydon, and Sacred Heart Monastery, Canberra. During the years at Canberra, he completed a BA at the Australian National University.

Ordination, July 22^nd, 1967.

Denis has spent most of his 50 years of priesthood in Education, teaching at Downlands and Chevalier, as Principal of Monivae and Daramalan.  Later, he was Director of MSC Education.

In recent years, he has been stationed at the Chevalier Resource Centre, Kensington.

ACKNOWLEDGING RENE BALBOA, ENDING HIS TERM AS MANAGER.

For the last decade, Rene Balboa has served the Australian Province at Treand House as Business Manager. He has given reports at Provincial Chapters and Provincial Conferences. Many of us have worked with Rene on budgets and on individual cases.

Rene is originally from the Philippines. He is married to Cynthia who did some part-time work at Treand House over the years.

In late 2019, Rene was one of the participants at an international meeting in Rome of bursars from around the world.

This is an opportunity to thank Rene for his commitment and dedication in his work and to wish him and Cynthia well in the next phase of their life.

REQUIEM MASS, TED MERRITT MSC, THURSDAY APRIL 16th.

The Requiem at St Paul's Church, Nightcliff, can be seen on YouTube - live at Darwin time, then available.

Perhaps  our covid-19 lockdown experience could be setting a precedent for future Requiems.

A MESSAGE FROM THE IRISH MSC PROVINCE, CARL TRANTER, PROVINCIAL

We can compere notes with our Irish confreres.

 On Tuesday of this week the Superior General was supposed to have arrived in Dublin to commence his four-week visitation of Ireland and England over the Easter period. He was also due to participate in our Provincial Chapter, set to commence on 20th April and which we have been planning for the last 18 months. Of course, both of these events have had to be postponed. All of the planning is suspended, and the air tickets from Rome, South Africa, Venezuela, USA and England have been cancelled. We have no idea when we may be able to reschedule these and other postponed events. To a large extent life seems to be on hold. If this is true for the life of the Province, it is also true for each one of us individually. We have seen our diaries suddenly empty and our plans set aside. We are experiencing a total change to our lives, our routines and our days like we have never experienced before. Many are living in closer proximity to one another than we are used to, or we are living alone in a way that can be isolating and lonely. Sometimes it is hard, and we struggle and find ourselves getting impatient.

Undoubtedly this is a very unsettling time. These last days we have heard the deeply sad news that the virus has claimed the lives of MSCs in France and Belgium. Others are very sick. Apart from the anxiety we experience by the swift, indiscriminate and destructive progress of the Coronavirus around the world, we seem to be robbed of our power to “do” something. We are being told that the best way we can collectively defeat this is to “do” nothing – to stay at home. It seems counter-intuitive. We are also aware that for a large number of our citizens, they are being called on to take significant risks and work extra-long hours at the service of our countries – our health professionals and hospital staff, supermarket workers and people in the food supply chain, our police and emergency services and many other public servants. They have no choice but to “do” something, and often what they do is nothing other than heroic. As religious, as pastoral persons and as missionaries, it can be hard for us to accept the restrictions put on us. Our natural instinct is to be with those we serve, to be with those who suffer, to accompany them, to support them, to pray with and for them. It is not in our DNA to “do” nothing.

Necessity, however, becomes the mother of invention. We have often repeated this saying. But now we know it to be true. We are witnessing a Church that is each day finding new ways to reach out and be present to the people of God, and to the world. I was especially struck by the powerful imagery and symbolism of Pope Francis standing alone in an empty St Peter’s Square to bless the City and the World in his Urbi et Orbi address. The previous week I joined more than 15,000 people to watch on-line as my good friend, Fr David Oakley, was ordained Bishop of Northampton in an empty cathedral on 19th March. If it had been the celebration which was planned, with just two representatives of each parish of the Diocese in attendance, it would have been a much smaller ecclesial event. As it was, thousands more wanted to connect and be involved.

Over the last few weeks we have seen a myriad of online spiritual resources being made available to help nourish people through these uncertain times. Social networking and digital media are coming into their own. We, ourselves, are discovering that more and more of our own friends, parishioners and benefactors are turning to our live-stream to join us for mass and prayer from Sacred Heart Church, Cork. Our community in the Western Road has done a marvellous job in planning a schedule for Holy Week that will allow many to join us in celebrating these days that stand at the very centre of our faith and which speak with a new power and poignancy this year. Our people are longing for connection, comfort and nourishment, and that is something we can still provide. We might be staying at home, cocooned and isolated. But we are being challenged to be ever more connected, present and open-hearted.

We may find ourselves frequently reflecting on the isolation of this time, but in reality many of us are experiencing ourselves very much connected – to family, to friends, to fellow MSCs and to people that we mightn’t have had much contact with for a long time. Here in Terenure I am in regular contact with our Regional, Sectional and local Superiors and my fellow Provincials from around the world. The world seems a very small, connected place. Perhaps one of the advantages of having more time on our hands is the ability to make space for communication.

A MESSAGE FROM THE IRISH MSC IN TEXAS, KEVIN SHANAHAN MSC

Greetings from San Antonio, Texas

I am happy to report all the brothers are well and exercising all the required precautions laid down by the State and City ordinances. We are all trying to adjust to a new way of living and being at this time. We are practicing social distancing, physical distancing and cocooning as required.

This has brought its own challenges for us who are in fulltime ministry. We are becoming technically savvy in the use of Facebook and greater utilisation of our church’s website.

Celebrating Mass everyday online with no congregation has taken us a bit of getting used to. No doubt my brothers have far more advanced technology than we have at St. Anthony’s.

Zoom – Up until 10 days ago, I had never heard of Zoom. For me, Zoom was zooming from one place to another. How wrong I was. This is becoming the normal means of communication between parishes and the Chancery office. However, I have included some interesting facts about zoom. Now you will know what people are doing and thinking during these conferences.

We are all finding it challenging to pastorally minister to the people of our parishes, but most especially at times of grief during this pandemic. We are trying our best to reach out to the bereaved families by any means possible.

A local funeral home here in San Antonio has come up with a unique approach to the celebration of funeral services. They invite families and friends of the bereaved to attend the service at makeshift outdoor movie theatres, where they can watch the service from their vehicles while the service is live-streamed on the big screen.

This is a very trying time for all of us. Let us continue to keep each other, and those we minister to, in prayer at this time.

EASTER BLESSINGS, 2020 STYLE

All over the world, Holy Week ceremonies have been streamed.  Our Australian MSC parishes have celebrated in this way (links to some of them on the Province Facebook page). St Thomas, Blackburn, is the MSC parish in Melbourne along with Cuskelly House, the formation house.

A time for collaboration and here are some photos of the film crew at work at Blackburn, Anh, Kenji and Mark.

We have been recording masses and posting them on YouTube since the restrictions came into place.

Mark built that light from scraps, spending only $5 at Bunnings for a power plug.

Terry is the lead, with Vincent in the supporting role.

Marg, Margaret Burchill IBVM, our pastoral assistant, comes in for stage design and flowers.

But the real hero is Anh, who spends hours editing and uploading the footage.

There seems to be a bit of a cult following, with Holy Thursday receiving 1.5K hits.

The shooting takes place in the church in the evenings for lighting consistency, and at least two days prior so that we have time to edit.

Terry has received lots of positive feedback – the elderly and housebound seem grateful for this service.

Wishing you and the community every best wish and joy with the risen Lord, alleluia! 

[Meanwhile in lockdown at Kew, there was difficulty in our candle's continually going out. The community leader of Victoria and Tasmania offered a solution: to consult Wik-ipedia. Alleluja.]

RIP. TED MERRITT MSC

Steve Dives writes: We just received the sad news that Ted Merritt passed away at 3pm NT time today, Holy Thursday, April 9th.

Ted’s suffering is over and he has gone to his God whom he served so well.

We pray for Ted and also his family who were unable to visit him in his final days.  Here we reprint the tribute from Malcolm Fyfe MSC on the occasion of Ted's 90th birthday celebration in Darwin.

Edward Patrick Merritt was born on January 17th 1928 at Corinda, a suburb of Brisbane. His parents were Edward, an accountant, and Mary. He had a brother James, who tragically died in a motor cycle accident as a young man and two sisters, Maureen and Margaret, whom he will visit in a few days' time down in Brisbane. Young Ted Merritt was educated at St Joseph's Christian Brothers College at Gregory Terrace in Brisbane, after having spent his primary years at Corinda's Catholic School, run by our sister-congregation, the Daughters of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

Even as a Secondary School student, young Ted felt a call to a religious vocation but it was only when he was 25 years of age that he took 'a leap in the dark', as he put it, and travelled down to Douglas Park, south of Sydney, to join the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart as a Brother. Up till that point he had been working in the motor industry, a job that would stand him in good stead in his subsequent missionary labours. Of course, had young Ted started his formation to become a Religious at the early age most youngsters in those days did, we might well be celebrating the 65th anniversary of his profession round about this time!

With Bishop Eugene Hurley

Whatever about that, young Ted decided to become a Brother in what was, in that day and age, a two-tiered Congregation of priests and lay-brothers, as they were then called. To illustrate this feature, I can mention that Father Linckens, Superior General of the Congregation early last Century, actively discouraged conversations between novices for the priesthood and novices for the brotherhood because he felt that (and I quote) "the brothers would be exposed to the temptation to become priests" A temptation indeed! And on the other hand, a few years later, his successor as MSC General, Father Meyer, noted that students for the priesthood were not to engage in manual work, especially farm work, because "it would distract them from studies of great importance". It was the Second Vatican Council that initiated a change in this mentality to the point that all members of a religious congregation were to see themselves as brothers in the Lord, whatever their role or function.

In pronouncing his first commitment as a religious on August 5th, 1954, Brother Ted used a formula which included the following words: "Lord Jesus Christ, trusting in the boundless mercy of your Sacred Heart and called, through the gift of your Spirit to follow and serve you, so that the world may come to know your love for the Father and for all mankind and so that your Kingdom may come, I vow for three years obedience, chastity and poverty in the Society of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart according to its Constitutions." Pronouncing these beautiful and motivating words is one thing but living them out faithfully over a subsequent 60 year period, as Brother Ted has done, is an achievement indeed.

Six years later, Brother Ted again repeated that formula of religious commitment, but this time for life.
In those intervening six years Brother Ted had worked as a gardener at Douglas Park for two years, in the office of the MSC publication "The Annals" for two years and in our boarding Colleges for a similar period. Again, this range of tasks, together with the skills he had earlier acquired in the workforce, prepared him for his subsequent life at mission stations in the Northern Territory and Papua New Guinea. He was eventually to spend forty eight years here in the Territory and three years at Sideia in Eastern Papua.

Missionary life in the 60's and 70's was tough and at times, harsh in the extreme. Our Northern Territory and Papuan missionaries, especially in earlier times, were expected to be self-reliant men of grit and perseverance, capable of enduring isolation and an exacting lifestyle, with expertise in sharing the faith along with the practical skills needed to cope with almost any contingency. The era of such missionary heroes is fast fading from living memory: still readily admired, less likely to be emulated.

From 1960 onwards, Brother Ted lived and worked for significant periods on all of our NT Mission stations: at Bathurst Island, at Wadeye, at Woodycupaldiya where he lived for a time in a demountable, at Daly River and at Santa Teresa, 80 km south east of Alice Springs - at times the resident mechanic, at times the accountant or the town clerk, and then at the age of 60 he learnt how to fly a plane and acquired his pilot's licence. It is impossible in this short homily to recall in any detail the day-to-day challenges faced-up to, the dramas that occurred, the simple joys of life experienced, the many relationships forged. The passing of the years has not dimmed the memories retained by the indigenous people that he came to know tens of years earlier and he is still greeted with an affection, mixed with nostalgia for bygone happier days, by those he laboured on behalf of during the Mission era, sharing with them his extensive knowledge of vehicles and equipment, so that they were happy to work alongside him.

In 2001 Brother Ted withdrew to Darwin, living at the MSC Centre, aka "The Ranch". It was not to be a retirement but a new lease of life, dedicated to the St Vincent de Paul Society, at the beck and call of innumerable people on the margins of society, with their many and various needs and their importunate requests for immediate help. Brother Ted matches these activities with repairs and maintenance tasks at The Ranch, with an energy level that people twenty years younger than him could well be envious of.

With Bishop Hurley and Peter Hendriks MSC who visited Ted in hospital during his illness

I should also state from personal observation that it is not just what Brother Ted does by way of good works but the manner in which he does them, and by that I mean his availability and his compassionate manner. Add to that his spirit of prayer and the hours spent in Chapel and you get some idea of the Source that sustains his vitality.

I have no doubt that, on Judgement Day, when the great division takes place, with the sheep on the right and the goats on the left, that Brother Ted will hear those comforting words:
"For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; sick, and you visited Me; in prison, and you came to Me."

All in all, as I have already said, Brother Ted has spent 48 years of dedicated ministry here in the Diocese of Darwin and so it is fitting that we are able to celebrate his 60 years of Religious Life with him at this time and in this place.

Thanks, Brother Ted, for your enormous contribution to the life of our MSC Congregation, to the work of the Church in a variety of places and activities, with special reference to your varied ministry in the Northern Territory. Your 60-year track record with its ongoing religious commitment is something of which anybody could be justly proud. 

TRIDUUM 2020

We have been reminded that the early Christians did not gather in Churches but in small and home groups to celebrate the Eucharist.

We are in lockdown finding ways to pray and to celebrate in ways we never anticipated.

Our MSC parishes are providing ceremonies on line.  For those connected with the Province Facebook page, there have been many posts and these continue, Randwick, Darwin, Henley Beach, Blackburn, Moonah.

For those not on Facebook, it is worth Googling to find the links.

Our site is offering images and words to contemplate and reflect on for these days until the joy of Easter and Resurrection.

HOLY THURSDAY

Holy Thursday is Eucharist and the new love of, love as Jesus loves us.

GOOD FRIDAY

Remembering and identifying with the aloneness of Jesus on the cross.

HOLY SATURDAY

Governor Cuomo of New York urged people to value social and spiritual connection.

We experience physical distancing. We find ways of spiritual connectedness.

Photo, Roy O'Neill

Jesus is buried. The night is dark. But there will be Resurrection light.

BOTH SADNESS AND ENCOURAGEMENT IN THIS COVID-19 LENT

We are posting Chris McPhee’s letter of encouragement of the Province in these lockdown Coronavirus times – how we might manage it well.

But, first, a sad postscript to yesterday’s news from Abzalon, Superior General. This message arrived today.

“We communicate to you that today our confrere Fr. Alfonso de Nijs has passed away in Belgium. Our condolences to his family and to our confreres of the Belgian Province.

Andre Claessens MSC
We also ask you to pray for Andre Claessens (member of the General Team) and for Paul Verbruggen, both of whom have tested positive for COVID19.  Andre is in Belgium at the moment. Our solidarity and prayers are with the entire MSC community at Borgerhout, in Belgium.”

Dear Brother MSCs

“All of us will strive to remain united in Spirit…”  [CS#30]

I think it goes without saying that we are living in one of the most challenging times we’ve ever experienced.

As Provincial, during these times, my question to all of us is: how might we care for ourselves and others during this time?

My simple advice would be this; take healthy breaks from political discussions, social media and the news – especially ABC24 and the like.  We need to set boundaries and to have limits on how we engage in these activities.

At this time, we need to focus on our physical, social, emotional and spiritual needs. Experts are saying that we need a minimum of one-half hour of downtime each day.  In fact, from where I am sitting, for many of us, the need is more.

From our own MSC traditions – things like, the Office, daily prayer, spiritual practices of meditation, contemplation, creating art, mindfulness, spiritual reading [or just a good novel] can and will refresh us with focus and peace. Again, it’s important to ensure there’s time for these activities each day.  This includes spending time being connected with people who give us a sense of community; especially those on their own, overseas, or new to our MSC community coming from overseas — in effect, increasing our personal MSC community both locally and virtually.

Who in our Province needs to be contacted to see how they are – they may even live overseas?  As a line in Constitution 30 says; “…All of us will strive to remain united in Spirit...” How do we remain united in Spirit when we are all in lockdown?  How do we stay connected as we are being directed further and further into isolation?  Now is the time we need to be creative with ways of being united with our brothers – things like skype, a phone call, Zoom, WhatsApp, Viber and the list could go on and on.  Even think about setting up groups that will keep you connected such as WhatsApp or Messenger groups. 

How do we stay connected, especially to those who are living on their own?

This week, I invite all of us to contact someone – maybe a younger MSC – maybe an older MSC – maybe an MSC we have never really spoken to.  Maybe just get the directory out and find someone that you feel you’d like to connect with. As Constitution 33 reminds us; “True Community does not come about all at once.  It grows by God’s grace and the constant effort of each member.  It needs to be built up each day…

Maybe this is an opportune time whereby we can start to think and be creative in new ways as to how we build up our MSC community.

Finally, I sense, at this moment a fair amount of our MSC’s are feeling anxious or distressed about COVID19.  May I suggest a few techniques that could help:

• Recognize that your concern is a valid reaction. Be present and mindful of your emotions to observe when they escalate.
• Maintain your regular routines and social connections to ensure that you’re not isolating yourself. [Refer above]
• Seek accurate information from reliable resources.
• Be aware of the spread of inaccurate or exaggerated information on social media platforms.
• Limit exposure to constant news updates [refer above].
• Distinguish possibility from probability.
  • For example, it might be possible that you will get infected, but what is the probability? How likely is that to happen?
• Challenge the need for certainty.
  • If you are trying to rule out absolutely all possibility of negative outcomes – such as coming into contact with someone who is sick, touching a surface that a sick person might have touched, determining whether or not someone might be infected – then it would be difficult to lead a productive lifestyle. This illness, like all previous viruses will affect some people and not others.
• Distinguish between productive and unproductive worry.

Signs of unproductive worry:

• You worry about unanswerable questions.
• You worry about a chain reaction of events.
• You reject a solution because it is not a perfect solution.
• You think you should worry until you feel less anxious.
• You think you should worry until you control everything.

Signs of productive worry:

• There is a question that has an answer.
• You are focused on a single event, not a chain reaction.
• You are willing to accept imperfect solutions.
• You do not use your anxiety as a guide.
• You recognize what you can control and what you cannot control.

As I said earlier, practice relaxing rituals, such as meditating, exercising, or engaging in deep breathing exercises.

Let’s stay positive and together as we pray and trust that we will all be safe under the protection and guidance of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

In His heart,

Chris R McPhee msc

SOME MSC CORONAVIRUS UPDATES:  VIETNAM, EUROPE - FRANCE, BELGIUM, SPAIN

A message from Fr. Hoang, MSC Superior in Vietnam on the situation there.

“Greeting from Việt Nam, How are you? And our dear MSC confreres? I hope that all of you are safe there. In this email, I just would like to update you about Covid-19 situation here in Saigon, where our houses are located.

Till now the total number of those affected by Corona virus is slightly increasing every day, 153 persons. Most of them are in Saigon. The situation becomes worse day by day. And the government is more strict and careful. Till now all flights to Saigon and Hanoi are banned. No more Vietnamese from abroad go back to Viet Nam. Many areas in the city are locked down. Many services in the city are forced to stop working: restaurants, shops, bars, coffee shops, ..., even barber shops. No more gathering from people for any reason.

Above all, all activities of all kinds of religions are banned. So, no more Mass in parishes and in all religious communities. This will go on indefinitely.

So our activities in our community are also affected. At the moment, we would have no more any gathering. We just stay in each house with in-door activities: mass, prayers, ... And off course we limit our going outside.

Till now the construction is still going on well. I am not sure that it would be affected by the virus situation at the moment? Hope that it would be fine.

And in Europe, some information from Abzalon, Superior General.

It is with a heavy heart that we share with you all, the sad news that this morining Br. Robert Ryckebusch, MSC (French MSC Province) has returned home to the Father'.  He is the first MSC who has passed away due to COVID 19. Despite the sadness of this moment we thank God for the living missionary witness of Br. Robert. He spent many years in Senegal and was a deep presence in Issoudun. He was a member of the community at ACCATES, in Marseille.

COVID19 has also affected two confreres in Belgium who are still in hospital. They are: Alfonso de Nijs and René (Renato) Van looy (who is waiting for test results).

But we also communicate the joy that three confrères in Spain have been able to recover from COVID 19: Manolo Barahona, Jose Ramon Gárate and Willy Mendez.  We trust that their recovery process will continue well and we rely on the prayers of all, for our two Belgian confreres who are still in hospital. Both were missionaries in Brazil for many years.

ACKNOWLEDGING JOHN BOSMAN MSC, 80.

John Bosman was born on April 6^th 1940, a month before the Nazi invasion and occupation of the Netherlands, May 1940

The Bosman family migrated to Australia in the 1950s, settling in Adelaide.

John made his novitiate in 1959, profession on February 26^th 1960, last month celebrating his diamond jubilee.

He studied at the Sacred Heart Monastery, Canberra, and was sent to Rome for studies at the Gregorian University. He and Barry Brundell, and former Superior General, Michael Curran, were ordained in the Scholasticate chapel in Via Aventina in 1966.

John completed a doctoral thesis in Moral Theology on St Gregory the Great.

In his more than 50 years of priestly ministry, he taught Moral Theology at the Yarra Theological Union, has served in parishes including Henley Beach and Randwick.  Also at Randwick, he was a chaplain at the Prince of Wales Hospital.  He has specialised in Breath and Breathing Studies (which must contribute to his ability to play the didgeridoo). His older brother, Henk MSC, is at the Sacred Heart Monastery, Kensington.

In recent years, John has been stationed at the Chevalier Resource Centre, Kensington.