SCJ Philippine District

On-going projects
At the moment all the five SCJ communities are involved in different constructions and renovations:

1. The Novitiate Community in Pagadian City is finishing the renovation of the facilities and accommodation of the Novices.




2. The Community of Dumalinao, after finishing of the renovation of the convent, started the renovation of the parish church.




3. The Community of Kumalarang is busy with the new ceiling of the parish church and building a new convent.




4. The Community of Cagayan de Oro continues the construction of the Formation House in Dansolihon, in the part of Lumbia Parish entrusted to the SCJs.


5. The Manila Community is finalizing the plans and arrangements of the new building for the theology students.

Hopefully, there will be no lack of energy and resources to finish all these projects.

Transfer of the SCJ Novitiate
On March 18, 2005, the SCJ Novitiate in Manila was officially transferred to Pagadian City. The new temporary Novitiate is located at the compound of the Holy Infant Seminary (Diocese of Pagadian) where the SCJ District rents two of the existing buildings. The new place is very nice and suitable.

Welcome Fr. Alex
Fr. Alexander Miskat Sim Lagajaya, another SCJ from Indonesia is taking his sabbatical in the Philippines. According to the information received, he arrived in Manila in the beginning of March 2005 and will stay in the Philippines until May 28, 2005. His plan is to come down to Mindanao and visit all the communities. Welcome and have a nice time!

Graduation of Fr. Agus Setyoaji
On March 5, 2005, Fr. Agustinus Setyoaji, a member of the Indonesian Province, defended his thesis in Liturgy. The official graduation will take place on April 16, 2005. After that his plan is to visit once again all the SCJ communities in Mindanao and then on May 28, 2005 to return to his Mother Province. On our side: Congratulations and thanks for being with us!

New Assistant Parish Priest in Kumalarang
Fr. Laurentius Suwanto, after finishing his language studies in Cebuano in Davao City, was assigned as an Assistant Parish Priest in Kumalarang. Fr. Suwanto will replace Fr. Andrzej Sudol, who on May 16, 2005 will move to the formation community in Cagayan de Oro City. His assignment took effect on March 1, 2005.

The number of the SCJ Novices has increased from 5 to 10. On March 28, 2005, five of the Postulants were officially admitted to the 14 month Novitiate. It took place at the chapel of the Holy Infant Seminary in Pagadian City, where on March 18, 2005 the Novitiate was temporarily moved. The celebration was presided by the District Superior Fr. Rino Venturin, scj and was attended by all SCJs of the Philippine District.

We give You thanks, Heavenly Father, that through Your Servant, Leo John Dehon, You desired to enrich Your Church with a new grace, calling Your children to be prophets of love and ministers of reconciliation in the Heart of Your Son.
If it be Your will, grant that the Church might beatify Leo John Dehon for the glory of Your Name and for the example which he gives to Your people.
Grant that his path be followed by many holy followers who will carry, from one end of the world to the other, the love of the Heart of Christ, the inexhaustible fountain of salvation.
To You be praise and glory, forever and ever.
Amen.


Prayer to obtain favours

O God, Father of mercy, you gave your servant, Blessed Leo Dehon the grace to contemplate deeply the pierced Heart of your Son, and to rediscover there the depth of your love for people, loving them just as you love them yourself.
Through his intercession we ask for the following intentions…
So may the whole Church give Gloria and praise to You.
(Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory be)

Our former General Superior, Fr. Virginio Bressanelli, SCJ, has been appointed by the Holy Father as the bishop of the diocese of Comodoro Rivadavia in Argentina. It was announced by the Holy See on February 19, 2005. The SCJ District in the Philippines welcomes this news with great joy and supports the new bishop with prayers.

Here, below is the text of the letter of the present General Superior, Fr. José Ornelas Carvalho, SCJ, sent to the whole Dehonian Family on this occassion.





Recife, February 19th, 2005

Prot. N. 52/2005


To the Members of the Congregation



Dear Brothers,

I’m extremely pleased to inform you that the Holy See has officially announced that the Holy Father has appointed as the bishop of the diocese of Comodoro Rivadavia (Argentina) our fellow-Dehonian Father Virginio Domingo Bressanelli, who is my predecessor as Superior general of the Congregation.

Father Virginio Domingo Bressanelli, born at Beravebù (Santa Fé, Argentine) on 1st May 1942, began his formation curriculum for the religious and priestly life at one of the apostolic schools of the Congregation in Argentine, from where he was then transferred in Italy, where he achieved his studies in the universitarian institutes of Trento, Monza and Rome.

During this period of studying in Italy he pronounced his first religious profession in Bolognano (Trento) on 29th September 1961 and later on he was ordained a priest in Rome, on 17th December 1966.

In 1967 he obtained the Licence in Theology at the Pontificial Gregorian University in Rome. Then he turned back in Argentine, where he continued studying psycho-pedagogics. Subsequently he set on to work in the pastoral care and in the formation field.

At the birth of the Argentina-Uruguay SCJ-Province in 1983, he was appointed as the 1st Superior Provincial, holding this office for two three year periods till 1989. His service was characterized by his enthousiasm and openness to the probems of the Province and of the whole Congregation as well. During these first years where the young Province was confronted first of all with the problem of being understaffed, he never shrinked back from helping the new presences of the Congregation sending out his own religious in missions that needed them more (the Philippines).
This style of his service was earning much approval also on the part of other religious bodies in Latin America who recognized in his personality great capacities for this type of service. For that very reason he was elected vice-president of Latin-America’s Major Superiors (CLAR) which post he occupied from 1988 to 1991.

In the run-up for the XIXth General Chapter of 1991, he was a member of the Preparatory Committee, and during the labour of the General Chapter itself he was elected to be the 8th Superior General of the Congregation, which post he held for two mandates (=12 years), from 1991 till 2003.

In the capacity of a General Superior he has been also member of the 18 Consultors to the Holy Congregation for the Evangelization of the Peoples, and moreover he has taken part in the Bishops’ Synod celebrated in 2001 which occupied itself with the theme of the role of the bishop in the world and in the Church.

When his General’s mandate had come to the end, he passed a sabbatical year in Spain, studying and updating his acquaintance with formation themes in order to prepare for the formator task that awaited him when once he had come back in his Province.

Today the Holy Father entrusts him with the episcopal ministry over the diocese of Comodoro Rivadavia, a diocese situated in the South of Argentine, in the Patagon solitude on the Atlantic coast.
According to the Annuarium Pontificium of 2004 this diocese the foundation of which dates February 11th 1957, has un extension of 234.000 km². It has about 413.000 inhabitants, 345.900 of which are Roman Catholics and the sum total of diocesan priests is 26, of seminarists 9, and 22 members of male institutes; all this for 33 parishes and 90 churches and mission stations.

A not light task is awaiting Father Virginio’s but thanks to his human, spiritual riches and skillful leadership, he will no doubt succeed in serving this church in the spirit and truth of a son of Father Dehon. This is a service he takes upon himself with much Dehonian disponibility and a great love to the Church.

Having got to know and appreciate Father Virginio in his service as Superior General of the Congregation, we partake the joy of the whole church of Comodoro Rivadavia for his appointment as their leader, and we remain grateful for his service to the Congregation as our Superior General and for the testimony of his life, simple and disponible, we have witnessed of.

On behalf of the Congregation we assure him of our brotherly support, consisting in friendschip, prayer and help, so that he may be the shepherd the local Church of Comnodoro Rivadavia needs: a shepherd after the Heart of Jesus.

This year of the Beatification of our Founder, we give thanks to the Lord for bestowing the episcopal consecration on our brother, and to the Holy Father for demonstrating his confiding in the person of Father Virginio and in the Congregation of the Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

We are brotherly associated with the Argentine Province, where Father Virginio was born for the religious life in the Congregation, celebrating togetherly the spirit of disponibility in the service of the Church, because we believe that God will not cease from blessing the generosity the Province furnished a clear proof of by accepting this service to the Church, specially in the context of the recent manpower problems the Province is facing up to.
We congratulate the relatives of Father Virginio also on behalf of the whole Congregation. We associate ourselves with them praying the Lord that he may bestow upon the new bishop abundant blessings for his service as the bishop of the Comodor Rivadavia diocese.

With kindes regards, in the Heart of Jesus,



Father José Ornelas Carvalho SCJ
Superior general

Today, the SCJ District in the Philippines started its annual assembly. During four days the members of the District will evaluate their activities and plan new ones. The assembly is attended by the General Councillor Fr. Andreas Madya Srijanto, scj and is going to finish on January 14, 2005.

"...A new year is about to begin, a year that the Church wants us to live with a eucharistic spirit. The invitation is to come to a richer appreciation of this most important gift for the life of the Church, but particularly to contemplate it and allow ourselves to be as “broken bread”. As SCJs we welcome, in this appeal aimed at every Christian, a plea to allow ourselves to be penetrated by a eucharistic dimension such that to speak of Dehonian spirituality without it would be meaningless. In our daily celebration of the Eucharist and our daily adoration of the Eucharist we find a source that enriches our lives, our communities, our apostolic service, and our love.
In the next few months we have to have the grace of celebrating the beatification of Fr. Leo Dehon. This is a grace that requires our hearts to open to a personal acquiescence of God’s plan for the Congregation, a plan that will certainly take it onwards and that will discover new motives and energies in the forthcoming General Conference on the Missions and in the work done in preparation for it.

The God who comes to “visit us from on high like the rising sun” (Lk 1:78b) is the One who will bring to pass the wishes for peace and fullness of life that we have for you and for every man and woman on this earth."

Merry Christmas

Fr. José Ornelas Carvalho, SCJ
Superior General
and his council

Full message