Newsletter of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer
Rome, Italy
February 16, 2006

From the Editor

February 2, the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, is a big day at the Vatican as it is also the World Day for Religious. All of the religious of Rome are invited to participate in the Pontifical liturgy and it is “standing room only” if you don’t arrive early. Our Superior General, Father Joseph Tobin, was a concelebrant at the liturgy, being only two positions away from the Holy Father at the altar, next to the Prefect for the Congregation of Religious. In the sacristy before the Mass, the Holy Father was heard to say to Father General, “Father Tobin, we’ve known each other for a long time.”

The SCALA archives are now available on the public area of our website http://www.cssr.com/ for our families, friends and collaborators to access. There is also a menu item to obtain their own individual e-mail subscription to SCALA in the languages offered. Just follow the menu tabs or “quick list” links: News – Scala Newsletter – Scala Subscription. We invite the units of the Congregation to publicize our website and SCALA’s availability. To facilitate receiving SCALA we recommend that you add this e-mail address to your address book: SCALA@CSSRIM.COM. It will help prevent it from being filtered out as spam.

We want to correct an error on the list of units with the statistics that we published last month. The numeric unit numbers are correct, but an error caused by no listing of 1509, the Ivory Coast, caused three units to be mislabeled by name. It should read: 1600 Praha; 1603 Bratislava; 1604 Michalovce. We regret the error. The archived versions are corrected. Brother Placido, our statistician, tells me unofficially that there are 3 priests, 2 brothers and 1 student in the Ivory Coast (1509). He’s waiting for their official report before he adds it to the list. But in the meantime you can pencil it in!

A few unit numbers and names have changed in the past year because of restructuring. This month we include a list of the current unit numbers with their corresponding province, vice province, region or mission name. You might want to print it out and place it in your editions of Catalogus and Inscriptiones for reference. This list can also be found on our website under the menu tabs or “quick list” links: Who are We – General Facts – Our Structures. The Secretary General is planning updated versions of the printed editions.

Have a fruitful Lenten season.

Grace and Redemption for All!
Gary Ziuraitis, C.SS.R.

Recent noteworthy events in the Redemptorist Family. For a complete record of transitions
visit the Officialia site

First Profession of Temporary Vows:
Jhonnyer Absalón Tamayo Colmenares, Vice Province of Caracas, January 5, 2006
Javier Alonso Ceballos Valencia, Province of Bogotá, January 5, 2006
Harold Octavio Centeno Niebles, Province of Bogotá, January 5, 2006
Luis Francisco Melo Ayala, Province of Bogotá, January 5, 2006
Nelson Mauricio Montoya Sánchez, Province of Bogotá, January 5, 2006
Fray Manuel Úsuga Gaviria, Province of Bogotá, January 5, 2006
Sandro Aparecido Da Cruz, Province of Campo Grande, January 21, 2006
Sérgio Reis De Lima, Province of Campo Grande, January 21, 2006
Roberto Claudio da Silva Filho, Province of Campo Grande, January 21, 2006
William Carlos Machado, Province of Campo Grande, January 21, 2006
Rugério Burkot Pietroski, Province of Campo Grande, January 21, 2006

Ordination to the Priesthood:
Chandana Sanujeeva Kumara Perera, Region of Colombo, October 13, 2005
Oscar Rojas Almiron, Vice Province of Resistencia, October 20, 2005

Episcopal News and Ordinations:
Most Reverend Michal Bzdel, Province of Yorkton, retired as Archbishop of Winnipeg Ukrainian Diocese, Manitoba Canada. January 9, 2006.
Most Reverend José Luiz Ferreira Salles, Vice Province of Recife, named auxiliary bishop of Fortaleza, Brazil. Nominated on February 1, 2006. Consecration will be on March 17, 2006 in Fortaleza.
Most Reverend Bohdan Dziurach, Province of Lviv, consecrated auxiliary bishop of Ukrainian Diocese of Kyiv-Vyshhorod, Ukraine, February 15, 2006.
Most Reverend Joércio Gonçalves Periera, Province of São Paulo, to be consecrated bishop at Our Lady of Aparecida Sanctuary, São Paulo, Brazil to serve as Coadjutor Bishop Prelate of Coari, Amazonas, Brazil. February 25, 2006.

Deaths:
Rev. Orlando Ricardo Gami, Province of São Paulo, November 22, 2005
Rev. Bernard Joseph Baumgartner, Province of Baltimore, January 1, 2006
Rev. Stanislaw Radwan, Province of Warsaw, January 1, 2006
Rev. Peter Martini, Province of St. Clements/Region of Cologne, January 10, 2006
Br. Jerzy Wojciech (Maksymilian) Jemielita, Province of Warsaw, January 11, 2006
Br. José Martins (Abel) Pinto, Province of Lisbon, January 12, 2006
Rev. William Francis Heanue, Province of Baltimore, January 19, 2006
Rev. Jerome Moody, Region of the Caribbean, January 22, 2006
Rev. Joseph John Elworthy, Province of Denver, January 27, 2006

Nominations:
Father John the Baptist Pham Quoc Hung nominated Vicar Vice Provincial of the Vice Province Extra Patrium. January 9, 2006.

Supression of House:
Domus ¨Viva Memoria¨ in the city of Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil. January 16, 2006.

   Index

News from the Provinces

Slovakia
The Vice Province of Michalovce

The Vice Province of Michalovce was begun in December, 1945 and officially established on March 23, 1946. The first Vice Provincial Superior to be nominated was Metod Dominik Trcka, today the now beatified martyr.

The Vice Province initially consisted of three communities: Michalovce, Stropkov and Sabino. At the time of its foundation, the Vice Province had 42 members: 14 priests, 11 brothers, 3 students, 3 novices and 11 pre-novices. Very soon a minor seminary was established in Michalvoce for students of the Byzantine rite. In the first three years the number of students rose to 39.

Soon the communist regime refused to recognize the Greek-Catholic Redemptorist Vice Province. For this reason the Vice Province could no longer exist and, at least publicly, had to be joined to the Vice Province of Bratislava. The Vice Provincial Superior, Fr. Trcka, despite this suppression by the communist government, tried to guide the Vice Province clandestinely, without the state police finding out. By March of 1950, the communists had suppressed definitively nearly all the monasteries and religious houses and the religious were interred in concentration camps. This policy also affected the Redemptorists. The Fathers and Brothers were interred; some were even tried by the communist courts in an unjust political process.

After 1968, after what was known as the “springtime of Prague” reform, there was yet another attempt to begin religious life again in Czechoslovakia, but the communist regime would still not permit it. Despite this the organization of religious life began illegally. The Superior of the Vice Province at that time was Fr. Ivan Mastiliak who had survived 15 years in a communist prison. The illegal formation of candidates to the religious life and priesthood was also begun at this time. Religious communities could not exist, but the Redemptorists who worked in parishes met and tried to live the fraternal life as best they could.

After 1989, the situation began to change. With the fall of the communist regime, religious life began to flourish again. The Vice Provincial Superior at that time was Fr. Stefan Lazor and from 1990, Fr. Milan Chautur, today the apostolic vicar of Kosice. Little by little the Redemptorists began leaving parish ministry to the diocesan clergy and tried to live in Redemptorist communities. The popular missions, a traditional Redemptorist apostolate, conducting the spiritual exercises and other apostolic works were begun anew. They once again took up the activities in the publishing house Misionar, where the monthly magazine Misioner and other religious literature are printed.

The Vice Province of Michalovce currently has 39 professed members: 1 bishop, 30 priests, 3 brothers in perpetual vows, 1 brother in temporary vows and 4 temporarily professed students of theology. There is also 1 student of philosophy and two novices, one of whom is a priest. The members of the Vice Province live in and work out of four communities in Slovakia (Michalovce, Stropkov, Stara L’ubovna and Korunkova), two in the Ukraine (Korolevo and Pidpolozja) and one in Canada (Toronto).

The Vice Provincial residence is in Michalovce. The publishing house Misionar and the Vice Provincial Archives are also located in Michalovce. In the Church in Michalovce one can find the remains of the beatified martyr Metod Dominik Trcka. The confreres are busy preacing popular missions, giving the spiritual exercises, working in the publishing house and doing pastoral work with those who come to the Church.

The Redemptorists have worked in Stropkov since 1921. Today they preach popular missions and do pastoral work in the parish. They also minister in the parish of Stropkov-Boksa. We have been in Stara L’ubovna since 1989. The Redemptorists stay busy with popular missions and pastoral work in the parish. Since 2004 the Korunkova community is the place for the novitiate. One confrere serves as a parish priest.

The Korolevo community in the Ukraine does parish ministry. Recently new apostolic works have begun such as the giving of missions. In Pidpolozja, also in the Ukraine, one confrere serves in the parish and in nearby sister churches. One confrere ministers in Toronto, Canada at the cathedral church of the Greek Catholics.

Region of Madagascar
Silvestro Lafasciano, C.SS.R.
Regional Superior

The Redemptorists of the Naples Province arrived in Madagascar in 1967. Their first residence was at Diego Suarez, in the north of the country, having being invited by the local Bishop. After having spent three years in the diocese of Diego Suarez, they founded two new missions at Ampanefena and Vohemar.

In 1989 the missionaries established the formation house in the capital, Antananarivo and after a few years founded another house also in the capital.

In 1999 the Bishop of the diocese of Ambatondrazaka invited us to his diocese and it was there the Novitiate was located.

The specific work of the Redemptorists in Madagascar is the animation of the people and the proclamation of the Gospel in the remote villages of the countryside and those in out-of-the-way places in the forests. In the capital we have charge of a sector on the city outskirts and the surrounding country area. Recently we have established a formation Center for the laity and catechists in Andranokobaka.

Help from the Mother Province, Naples, and the collaboration of Italian benefactors have enabled us to ensure education and medical assistance in two dispensaries as well as providing food for almost 3000 children who attend our catholic schools attached to our parishes.

At present 7 Italian priests work in Madagascar as well as a Mexican and a Slovakian. There are also 14 Malagasi priests, 3 coadjutor brothers and 7 students who have finished their studies and are doing their pastoral stage in the various communities.

Madagascar is a Region since March of last year. It is a new page in its history, the way being paved by the arrival three years ago of young confreres from the Naples province.

Until a few years ago the work done depended on the individual effort of each confrere. This is no longer so. We are now organised as a community with teamwork and structure.

Province of Strasbourg Luxembourg
Fr. Peter Alphonse.

The Province of Strasbourg presently has 50 members, including one priest from the Lyons-Paris Province, another from South Belgium and four confreres from Peru. The average age of the Province, taking into account all who work in the Province, is 71. The range of confrere’s ages range from 92 to 30 years.

At present we have five large houses in Alsace, 1 in Lorraine, 1 in Luxembourg and 1 in Montreuil near Paris. Some confreres live alone inserted in working-class groups or as parish priests.

Almost all our confreres are engaged in pastoral work. This is possible because our large houses have a Chapel or Church open to the public. Elderly confreres stay active and in active ministry as long as possible.

The house of Trois-Epis is the most active as it is an important center of pilgrimage in Alsace. Here three Peruvian confreres hold positions of responsibility: as Superior, Rector of the Sanctuary and Youth minister.

A pastoral plan has been worked out and entrusted to the province Secretariat for Evangelization to carry out. Some houses are due shortly to be sold or leased. These are Ostwald, Sarreguemines and Haguenau. The problem of our House in Luxembourg is also to be studied.

The pastoral work of the confreres is very diversified. It includes pilgrimages, parish ministry, insertion in migrant groups, worker-priests and chaplains, preaching, lecturing and helping the local church.

We collaborate with the confreres of the Lyons-Paris Province and occasionally with the Swiss. For example weeks of adoration are conducted at Trois-Epis, as well as giving weekly retreats to Sisters, aiding the house of Sarreguemines and assisting with youth ministry. A priest from South Belgium is helping out in Luxembourg until next August.

Our challenges:

Successful collaboration with the Province of Peru South.

The carrying out of our a Redemptorist pastoral plan to decide on the retention or suppression of houses, setting up a definite system of youth ministry and especially vocational ministry.

Reducing the amount of property.

Review as a result of the above, everything concerning temporalities and our relationships with other entities.

Move forward together in serenity and clarity, in that spirit of faith which animates us and urges us on even today to be witnesses of hope.

Index

In Spiritu Redemptionis

In Spiritu Redemptionis
Respect
Sean Wales, C.SS.R.

The British government has just launched a campaign on respect with the slogan “Give respect, Get respect”. People differ in their views about whether respect has faded (or disappeared altogether) because it is no longer taught by parents and schools or because institutions do not treat individuals (particularly the powerless) with respect. The innumerable stories of violence in the world and other social evils makes us wonder if there is any respect left in the world.

Any movement to restore the virtue of respect must first appreciate what respect is. From the Latin re-spicere, respect has to do with seeing again, seeing afresh, seeing into the reality. The philosopher Kant gave a philosophical insight (a form of respect) into our moral constitution when he wrote: “Act in such a way that you always treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never simply as a means, but always at the same time as an end”. Once we see ourselves as rational beings and see everyone else as rational beings we have a ground for treating all with the respect due to rational independent beings. This philosophical basis for respect is connected to the basic notion of human dignity and to the human right to be treated in accordance with our nature.

Those who live and work out of a religious world-view usually relate the very existence and structure of human nature to the God-dimension of reality: we are made in the image and likeness of God. While respect may be rooted in our human nature, our human nature is rooted in God. With religious insight we treat each one as an “imago Dei”.

This religious insight is hugely reinforced in the Christian perspective: “Do not let your love be a pretence, but sincerely prefer good to evil. Love each other as much as brothers should and have a profound respect for each other” . (Rom12.10). Through our baptism we are made parts of the body of Christ; we are called to treat one another with Christ-like respect; we are helped to see all people as respected by God and therefore to be respected also by us.

Divine respect lies behind our feeble efforts at human respect. Perhaps a contemplation of this divine respect will help us interiorize the values of this virtue of respect.

Our own Statutes speak about developing human and Christian maturity: “such things as showing mutual respect, helping one another, showing concern in a very discreet way for confreres beset with difficulties or afflicted with worries; being welcoming and showing hospitality to visiting confreres; a spirit of brotherly service, taking one’s share in domestic chores and similar things” (S. 031). This provides us with a ready made ‘examen’ on practical ways of showing respect for one another.

Modern psychology comes into the picture as well with the realization that a key to respect for others is a healthy self-respect. As long ago as Socrates, self-knowledge ( and therefore self-respect) was seen as a key to a balanced life. In psalm 138 (139) the psalmist could move effortlessly from “I thank you for the wonder of my being” to “for the wonders of all your creation”. Today respect is not limited to other human beings, but to the animal world, to plants and ecological systems: we live in a world more and more sensitive to the dimensions of respect.

Respect, in the end, is a synonym for love, but with a very practical face:, ready to excuse, to trust, to hope and to endure whatever comes. Respect is always patient and kind; it is never jealous; respect is never boastful or conceited; it is never rude or selfish; it does not take offence and is not resentful. Respect takes no pleasure in other people’s sins but delights in the truth; it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope and to endure whatever comes.

Richard Sennett, RESPECT IN A WORLD OF INEQUALITY. Penguin 2004
Lynne Truss, TALK TO THE HAND, The utter bloody rudeness of Everyday Life. Profile Books 2005

Index

Redemptorists in Vatican News

The Ukrainian Catholic Church
Background of a CSSR bishop appointment
Rocco Palmo

In recent times, the Pope has been giving his assents to the various elections of bishops in the Eastern Rites as decided upon by the synods of the respective churches in communion with the Holy See. As opposed to the Latin Synod of Bishops, the Eastern Synods sit at least once a year and enjoy deliberative governing authority in the administration of their respective churches, an autonomy respected to varying degrees by Rome.

In terms of filling appointments in the Eastern rites, the customary practice of the last decades has been that the particular Synod meets, casts its votes, sends the names to the Congregation for the Oriental Churches in Rome which, in turn, forwards them to the Pope for his assent or confirmation, at which point the appointment is effective and ordination or installation may proceed in accord with the Canons of the Eastern Churches, which were promulgated by John Paul II in 1991.

Last fall, Benedict XVI green-lighted a slate of appointments recommended by the Maronite Synod, which met in late September. But recently, a new formula has appeared in announcing something which the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic church already did months ago. And it signals a desired (and, some would say, seismic) devolution of even the vestiges of governance away from Rome and back to the churches on their home turf with a mutually beneficial end, unspoken for now but loudly present in the subtext.

In October, the Synod of the UGCC -- led by Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, who recently transferred his major-archeparchy from Lviv to the birthplace of Russian Christianity in Kiev -- elected auxiliary bishop Ihor Vozniak, C.Ss.R. of Lviv to fill the archeparchial seat there left vacant by Husar's eastward move. Vozniak was installed in Lviv in November without the traditional papal assent.

This morning, the other shoe dropped. In its announcement, the Holy See indicated that no papal assent was given -- implying, in a gesture unprecedented in recent times, that no papal assent needed to be given.

The announcement reads that Husar, "with the consent of the Synod of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and after having informed the Apostolic See, has transferred" Vozniak to the archiepiscopate of Lviv. (translation is my own.)

To contrast, even Husar's own election as major archbishop in succession to (the legendary) Myroslav Ivan Lubachivsky was confirmed by John Paul one day after it took place. (Husar was then named a cardinal two days following, the "key" among seven additional names added to the mega-list of 37 announced by the late Pope a week before.) Going further, when the major seat of the Ukrainian diaspora, the US archeparchy based in Philadelphia, was to be filled in late 2000, the Synod voted but it was announced that John Paul himself had chosen Stefan Soroka as the metropolitan, as if it were just any other Latin-rite appointment -- probably no mention was made of election and assent so as not to get the Latin-rite Americans disturbed about democratic selection of bishops, leading them to think that it was right around the corner.

"After having informed the Apostolic See, [Husar] has transferred..." -- an amazing, never-before-seen formulation. It puts clout in the hands of the Synod which, according to this statement, now enjoys the canonical power of the consent (previously the Pope's) and the major-archbishop, who is presented as the licit authority of selection and transferral (previously the prerogative of the Synod), all without any objections from Rome.

As the Apostolic See has not of yet made any explicit statement on Husar's August assumption of the major-archeparchial seat of Kiev, in light of this distanced statement (which ipso facto implied its blessing of the Kiev move), it doesn't seem like that'll be coming now.

But the bigger factor is this: Rome has sent the message that the Ukrainians need not wait for their consent anymore, a recusal which clears the pathway toward the UGCC's long-desired dream: The declaration of the Patriarchate in Kiev. And when that comes and the fireworks begin, the Vatican now has its leeway to say, "They're independent, they're doing what they want, we haven't tried to stop them before...."

Moscow
Reaction from the Russian Orthodox Church
Catholic World News

Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexei II repeated his insistence that the Vatican must stop Catholic "proselytism" in eastern Europe, during a December 30 meeting with journalists in Moscow.

Questioned about the likelihood of a "summit meeting" with Pope Benedict XVI, Patriarch Alexei said that Rome and Moscow have different perspectives on that possibility. While the Vatican believes that a face-to-face meeting could produce progress toward ecumenical unity, the Moscow Patriarchate argues that "such a meeting should be preceded by an improvement in relations," the Russian prelate said. The most difficult issues should be resolved before a summit meeting, he said, because "complex issues should not be raised and discussed during a meeting between the Patriarch and the Pope."

Patriarch Alexei told the press that he was hopeful for some ecumenical progress after a meeting of a joint Catholic-Orthodox commission, set up to discuss the issues that have caused disputes between the Vatican and the Russian Orthodox leadership. That committee met in Moscow earlier this week.

The Russian patriarch said that he hoped, in particular, the joint session would convince Catholic leaders that the Ukrainian Catholic Church, having recently established new headquarters in the capital city of Kiev, should return to Lviv, reversing a move made in August 2005. Such a move is highly unlikely. Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, the Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, recently appointed a new Archbishop of Lviv. The appointment was acknowledged by the Holy See, in a public statement which, for the first time, also recognized Cardinal Husar as the Archbishop of Kiev.

 Index

Monthly Picture Gallery (  for online viewing only)

1. Fathers Martone and Gasparro with some of the villagers in Madagascar

2. The formation house in Antananarivo, the capitol of Madagascar.

3. The parish church of Mandroseza, staffed by the Redemptorists.

4. The interior of the Church at Michalovce, Slovakia.

5. The monastery at Michalovce, Slovakia

6. The monastery at Bischenberg and Bischoffsheim in the province of Strasbourg.

7. The Notre Dame Pilgrimage Chapel which dates from 1651 (new Church in the left background) at Les Trois Epis, Alsace, in the province of Strasbourg.

8. The interior of the Notre Dame Church of Pilgrimage at Les Trois Epis.

9. Father General greets the Holy Father before the start of the Mass at the Vatican on the Feast of the Presentation.

10. Father General concelebrating with the Holy Father at the main altar of St. Peter's Basilicia on the Feast of the Presentation.

Index

Activities of Father General and the General Council

Interested in knowing where the members of the General Government are and what they are doing? The following link will take you to the Calendar of the General Government.

English: http://www.cssr.com/calendars/CalEN.htm

This link is in our cssr.com website under the Redemptorist section and require passwords. If you do not have them; a pop-up box will direct you to request them from the Secretary General.

This month’s featured website is that of the Baltimore Province: www.redemptorists.net

  Index

Announcements

Catalogus
2006 update of units

Below is an updated list of the units of the Congregation, provinces, vice provinces, regions and missions that updates the list found in your 2003 edition of the Catalogus

Index