Video

Here is a YouTube link about the Inter Franciscan Missionary Program. I hope you enjoy it. OED

https://youtu.be/Wf8GDCKSGXU

A Week in Rome

Just returned from Assisi after a week long retreat. It was a refreshing and renewing experience. I left Brussels before all the tension.  I understand that the metro system (rail and bus) were shut down.  I was shocked to see armed military personnel at both the lower, upper Basilica of St. Francis and at Our Lady of Angels. While I was shocked to see armed solders in the "City of Peace" others in my group were relieved. It all depends upon your perspective, I guess.

I will spend a week in Rome catching my breath after a long three months. I hope to spend a day at the Vatican Museum. The US State Department has advised US citizens to avoid St. Peter Square. The friars reported to me today that the numbers are as large as the always are but the lines into the Basilica move slowly.  I may venture there tomorrow.   Pace y Bene   OED

Laudato Si'

This is a Tag Cloud (also known as as Word Cloud) of Laudato Si', Pope Francis' recent encyclical. (A Tag Cloud is a visual representation of a text where the importance of each word is shown with a change is font size and color.) This week we have been studying this document as it applies to our mission.  Frequently, developing nations are subjected to extreme assaults on the environment by multi-national companies as they rape the land of its natural resources.  Only to take to wealth and leave nothing for the people who live live there. We were led by Bernd Beerman, a German Capuchin friar from Munster.  He is a chemist who gave us great insight into both the theological aspect of environmental protection but also the practical application of wise use of God's creation.

This is the last week of the program here in Belgium.  On the 17th we head to Italy!
Peace and All Good.  tim  ODE

Fall is here in Brussels.  Peace tim      OED

Mission Is...

Came across this while taking a seminar in Bonn, Germany.  I think this speaks to everyone.

Mission means setting out

Taking the road

Leaving everything behind

To come out of one's shell

To smash the crust of egoism

Which locks our self in our own Ego.

Mission means putting an end

To thinking oneself to be the pivot

Around everything turns

As if we were the very center

Of the universe and of life.

Mission means not limiting our self

To the problems of the tiny sphere

To which we belong.

The people are much greater.

Mission means always setting out

But not counting the miles.

Mission means above all else

Being available to others

Brothers and sisters

Seeking them out

And meeting them.

And if necessary

To cross seas and fly through the air

To find them and to love them,

Mission

is setting out

To go the farthest ends of the Earth.

Don Helder Camara

1909-1999