ABOUT OUR FAMILY

 

            Many bless­ings to you our extended fam­ily! I would like to take the time to update you on the hap­pen­ings here in our beloved but extremely hot Puerto Mal­don­ado, the Peru­vian jun­gle! Hap­pily, Jan­u­ary through March are months where it rains fre­quently, thus pro­duc­ing a kind of nat­ural air con­di­tion­ing. There is hope after all! I always joke with my broth­ers and sis­ters in com­mu­nity that when we enter into a build­ing or a plane and feel the brief relief of air con­di­tion­ing, I am reminded that God does indeed exist! God is good!

            Well my good friends, these past three months have been full of many bless­ings! They have been months of tran­si­tion as the com­mu­nity pre­pares to move to the House of For­ma­tion near the river “Madre de Dios”. This house can poten­tially be called “Nazareth Along­side the River” as our Bishop Fran­cisco Gon­za­lez named it while say­ing Mass with us one day (Nazaret al lado del Rio). Its con­struc­tion has def­i­nitely been a chal­lenge, tak­ing into account weather delays, hav­ing to find trust­wor­thy work­ers, and this being the first time doing con­struc­tion in the jun­gle region. God will­ing, we will be mov­ing some­time this year. (see pho­tos A and B)

          

Fr. Philip Scott has been on the move these past cou­ple of years going abroad to many places on mis­sion trips. He has been to Malaysia, the United Sates, Ecuador, and Colom­bia tak­ing the mes­sage of heal­ing of the fam­ily, God the Father’s love for each one of us, and the uni­ver­sal call to holi­ness. He has had tremen­dous expe­ri­ences in see­ing God’s love in action in the lives of many peo­ple. Fr. Isaac Fran­cis is tak­ing the helm of the con­struc­tion project. He and Fr. Lucas Maria have entered deeply into the “con­struc­tion world” and can now tell you inter­est­ing things such as where you can find the cheap­est and most reli­able wood and cement in Puerto Mal­don­ado! A beau­ti­ful aspect of their tag team effort has been the deep­en­ing of their friend­ship and union as com­mu­nity broth­ers. (see photo C)

            Fr. John Mary led a mis­sion in Ecuador this past Decem­ber, where he encoun­tered God’s fruit­ful love in a retreat he gave to a large group of young peo­ple. He also has been active here coor­di­nat­ing events with the “Pas­toral Juve­nil”, the group in charge of evan­ge­liz­ing the youth in Puerto. He has a tremen­dous gift in orga­niz­ing events, multi-tasking, and get­ting sev­eral things done to make these events happen. 

Br. Pio Mar­tin is off in Argentina dur­ing this time, tak­ing the oppor­tu­nity to deepen his rela­tion­ship with the Lord and hop­ing to do deep emo­tional and spir­i­tual healing. 

Fr. Isaac had a chance to visit with him this past Decem­ber, tak­ing to him the community’s “Happy Birth­day Card” since his birth­day is Novem­ber 25^th every year with­out fail! He has fit right into the swing of things there since much of their labor has to do with agri­cul­ture, some­thing Br. Pio hap­pily works with.

 Fr. Lucas Maria and Fr. Jose Maria (that’s me) have been blessed to be liv­ing out our priest­hood in many ways! Both of us have had the oppor­tu­nity to go back to our homes and offer Masses, con­fes­sions, and anoint­ings of the sick, etc. at our home parishes, high schools, and homes. It has been a tremen­dous bless­ing. After giv­ing the Sacra­ments to one elderly mem­ber of my fam­ily, they quickly phoned some­one and said to them that they were now ready to go home to meet the good Lord. The Lord is so good and is so faithful!

            Last but not least we have the beloved Sis­ters of Fam­ily of Jesus! As always they have added much to the rich­ness of our inte­rior fam­ily life as a com­mu­nity, help­ing us espe­cially with set­ting things up for Christ­mas and cel­e­brat­ing the birth­days of Fr. Isaac, Fr. Philip and Fr. Lucas this past Jan­u­ary. Mother Agnes is cur­rently in Cov­ing­ton, Louisiana assist­ing a young girl from “El Val­lecito”, a slum in Lima, as she gets a much needed spinal chord oper­a­tion done. We invite you to join us in your prayers for com­plete heal­ing and for the mir­a­cle that Estephany (the lit­tle girl of 13 years old) will one day walk again! We are pray­ing espe­cially for the inter­ces­sion of Blessed Mother Theresa of Cal­cutta, who actu­ally prayed over Estephany when she was a lit­tle baby in Lima. The Lord so far has mirac­u­lously pro­vided her with a tremen­dously costly oper­a­tion and ther­apy through the gen­eros­ity of won­der­ful doc­tors and donors who have coop­er­ated in the effort. (see photo F)

           

Sr. Mary Therese for her part is at home keep­ing down the fort as they say! Along­side two young girls, Ros­alinda and Eliz­a­beth, mak­ing a “Come and See” with the com­mu­nity, she is main­tain­ing the rhythm of reli­gious life in prayer, com­mu­nity time, coun­sel­ing, and grow­ing in holi­ness! (see photo G) She is excited to par­tic­i­pate more closely with the youth group we have called “Amor Puro”, as we seek to imple­ment the beau­ti­ful resources offered by such peo­ple as Jason and Chrys­talina Evert in The­ol­ogy of the Body for Teens (www.pureloveclub.com and www.tobforteens.com). Many bless­ings to you our good friends and extended fam­ily! Until next time!