Saturday, June 8

The Mass today was presided over by Friar Leo PAYYAPPILLY, the Minister Provincial of the Province of St. Maximilian M. Kolbe in India. 

Fri­ar Jude cen­tered his homi­ly on the fact that some­times even Jesus expe­ri­enced being mis­un­der­stood by his dis­ci­ples. There­fore, it is even more fit­ting that we accept mis­un­der­stand­ings and when we hear oth­ers crit­i­cize the way we speak or act, we should expe­ri­ence it a some­thing to offer up.
In the Chap­ter audi­to­ri­um, the work began with dis­cus­sion on Motion No. 9. The Gen­er­al Chap­ter decid­ed to erect the Provin­cial Cus­tody of St. Fran­cis of Assisi in Kenya, of the Province of St. Max­i­m­il­ian M. Kolbe in Poland (Gdańsk) as a Province.
Fri­ar Kaz­imierz SZULC, the Cus­tos of Kenya, gave a brief report on the sta­tus of his Juris­dic­tion. Kenya has around forty solemn­ly pro­fessed fri­ars and six fri­aries; the Juris­dic­tion is enthu­si­as­ti­cal­ly involved in pas­toral activ­i­ty, car­ing for the poor and pro­mot­ing vocations.
Fri­ar Jan MACIEJOWSKI, the new­ly elect­ed Vic­ar Gen­er­al, gave his sup­port to the Motion as the for­mer Min­is­ter Provin­cial of Kenya’s Moth­er Province. The new­ly elect­ed Assis­tant Gen­er­al for the African Fed­er­a­tion of Con­ven­tu­al Fran­cis­cans (AFCOF), Fri­ar Antho­ny Bezo KUTIERO, gave his approval to the Motion. Fri­ar Tadeusz ŚWIĄTKOWSKI, also gave his sup­port in the name of the out­go­ing Definitory.
There were enthu­si­as­tic speech­es in the Aula about the jour­ney of our con­fr­eres in Africa. We give thanks to the Lord for the progress we have made and for what we can do in the future. The Capit­u­lars vot­ed by accla­ma­tion and unan­i­mous­ly approved the Motion.
Then, Fri­ar Max­i­m­il­ianus Kalef SEMBIRING, the Cus­tos of the Provin­cial Cus­tody of Mary Immac­u­late in Indone­sia pre­sent­ed Motion No. 10. The Gen­er­al Chap­ter decid­ed to erect the Provin­cial Cus­tody of Mary Immac­u­late in Indone­sia, of the Ital­ian Province of St. Antho­ny of Pad­ua (North­ern Italy) as a Province.
Indone­sia has eight fri­aries and around sev­en­ty-five solemn­ly pro­fessed fri­ars. It is engaged in many pas­toral-char­i­ta­ble activ­i­ties and the prospects for the future there are very promising.
The Vic­ar Provin­cial of the Moth­er Province, Fri­ar Rober­to BRANDINELLI, and the for­mer Min­is­ter Provin­cial of the Moth­er Province, Fri­ar Gio­van­ni VOLTAN, now the new­ly elect­ed Assis­tant Gen­er­al for the Fed­er­azione Inter-mediter­ranea Min­istri Provin­ciali (FIMP), gave their approval and thanked the fri­ars of the Cus­tody for their work. Fri­ar Bene­dict Seung-jae BAEK, the Assis­tant Gen­er­al for the Fed­er­a­tion of Asian Minor Con­ven­tu­als (FAMC), also offered his assent to the Motion.
The dis­cus­sion fur­ther high­light­ed the fine progress made by the con­fr­eres in Indone­sia. We thank the Lord for the gifts we have received and for those yet to come. At the end, the Motion was unan­i­mous­ly approved.

Today’s work end­ed at lunchtime. In the after­noon, there was an option­al trip to the city of Todi (Province of Peru­gia) Italy.

Fri­ar Aure­lio ERCOLI, Chronicler

 

In the Gospel today we hear about the Beloved Dis­ci­ple.  Peter asks whether he would still be alive at the sec­ond com­ing.  Jesus answers him by telling him it is none of his busi­ness.  Notice, the com­mu­ni­ty mis­un­der­stands what he is say­ing and think that he promised that he would still be around.  Jesus nev­er said that.  He only said that it was none of Peter’s business.
We who exer­cise author­i­ty in the Order and the Church will be mis­un­der­stood.  Even if we try our best, some peo­ple will ques­tion our motives.  At times, they will say lies about us. 
This reminds me of when I had a very dif­fi­cult time with some­one who was say­ing lies about me.  It hurt me deeply.  I went to a coun­selor to work out my feel­ings.  He asked me what I was most afraid of.  I prayed about it, and told him I was afraid of los­ing my good name.  He laughed and said, “Jude, you’re a Fran­cis­can, you don’t have the right to have a good name.”
It made me real­ize, I had promised to live sine pro­prio, but I was hold­ing what oth­ers said of me as my own pos­ses­sion.  If oth­ers say bad things about us, don’t let it get to you.  Be a fri­ar of integri­ty, and the truth will even­tu­al­ly be dis­cov­ered.  And if in the mean­time you have to suf­fer from what they are say­ing, be grate­ful that now you can suf­fer for the truth, for that suf­fer­ing will cer­tain­ly puri­fy your heart of what­ev­er is not from God.