1 “So many memories flood our minds and move us as we thank the Lord for giving us these sisters. We en- joyed their friendship and fraternity, having been eyewitnesses of their passion for Jesus, in the Gospel, for the poor. All three, despite their advanced age and frail health, had longed to re- turn to Kamenge. Olga could not conceive the idea of having to stay in Italy. Despite ad- vancing years, she held a great ap- ostolic zeal. She loved to meet peo- ple on the street, visited families, and she willingly accompanied the elderly who could not get to the par- BIRTHDAYS & ANNIVERSARIES 2014 OCTOBER 3—Fr. Aniello Salicone 4—Fr. Noel To- masi 14—Fr. Valerian Cobbe 29—Fr. Alex Ro- driquez Gomez NOVEMBER 5—St. Guido Ma- ria Conforti 12—Fr. Joseph Zanardi 13—Fr. Henry Frassineti 16—Fr. Bob Maloney 21—Fr. Rocco Serra Issue 141 Sept 2014 The Xaverian Missionaries USA The Xaverian Missionaries USA The Xaverian Missionaries USA A ll of us are shaken to the core at the news of the murders of three of our sisters: Srs. Olga Raschietti, Lucia Pulici, and Bernadette Boggian. We are also well aware of the details their deaths and the ongoing investigation with no real conclusions why they were killed. As we all grieve, especially our sisters, we gather our hearts in prayer, cele- brating the lives of Olga, Lucia, and Bernadette, the courage of faith and long lived missionary lives. Sr. Giordana and the sisters of the General Direction shared this message with our sisters: In Solidarity with our Sisters In Solidarity with our Sisters In Solidarity with our Sisters
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“So many memories flood our minds and move us as we thank the Lord for giving us these sisters. We en-joyed their friendship and fraternity, having been eyewitnesses of their passion for Jesus, in the Gospel, for the poor.
All three, despite their advanced age and frail health, had longed to re-turn to Kamenge.
Olga could not conceive the idea of having to stay in Italy. Despite ad-vancing years, she held a great ap-ostolic zeal. She loved to meet peo-ple on the street, visited families, and she willingly accompanied the elderly who could not get to the par-
BIRTHDAYS &
ANNIVERSARIES
2014 OCTOBER
3—Fr. Aniello Salicone
4—Fr. Noel To-masi
14—Fr. Valerian Cobbe
29—Fr. Alex Ro-driquez Gomez
NOVEMBER
5—St. Guido Ma-ria Conforti
12—Fr. Joseph Zanardi
13—Fr. Henry Frassineti
16—Fr. Bob Maloney
21—Fr. Rocco Serra
Issue 141
Sept 2014
The Xaverian Missionaries USA The Xaverian Missionaries USA The Xaverian Missionaries USA
A ll of us are shaken to the core at the news of the murders of three of our sisters: Srs. Olga Raschietti, Lucia Pulici, and
Bernadette Boggian. We are also well aware of the details their deaths and the ongoing investigation with no real conclusions why they were killed.
As we all grieve, especially our sisters, we gather our hearts in prayer, cele-brating the lives of Olga, Lucia, and Bernadette, the courage of faith and long lived missionary lives.
Sr. Giordana and the sisters of the General Direction shared this message with our sisters:
In Solidarity with our SistersIn Solidarity with our SistersIn Solidarity with our Sisters
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I ssue 141 Page 2
-ish in the preparation of the sacraments.
Lucia, for her part, was discov-ering more every day that what mattered was her life given with joy to the Lord for the mission, in the acceptance and prayer. According to her strength, served the community, welcomed the sisters and the people pass-ing by, took care of some sick, poor, and shared services in the parish.
Bernadette had the gift of bring-ing all with simplicity and ten-derness. Her smile welcomed people who came near her. For years she served in leadership for the community and lived among the people, participating in the life of Christian communi-ties, accompanying young peo-ple, boys and girls, in the sewing school in the parish, always at-tentive to the needs of the poor-est.
Now the bodies of our sisters Olga, Bernadette and Lucia rest in Bukavu next to Louise Gal-braith and other missionaries, in the land that they loved so much and where they have lived most of their years. The brutal and absurd death is the result of a life spent in the service of God and their brothers and sisters. Through their witness, we derive strength, proclaiming to the world the beauty and boldness of the Love that exceeds all bound-aries.
Although we prepared our Gen-eral Chapter IX praying and reflecting more deeply on the
"All" of Jesus, the sacrifice of our sisters painfully surprised us and made us experience once again our smallness. But we have the ability and grace to believe that the grain of wheat, which falls to the earth,, dies, and bears much fruit in witness to us all. It is striking that at the very end of the chapter, in which We are attracted and seduced by God's compassion for us. Olga, Bernadette and Lucia have par-ticipated in this way of the pas-sion of the Lord Jesus. They are for us the living icon of the mis-sionary who puts her trust in the Lord and do not count the cost, in order to reach out to others, in a spirit of care and good heart, able to live in communion and to cooperate with others.
We wrote a sister who attended the Chapter: "We talked a lot about the 'All' of the elderly sis-ters who are young at heart (...) I feel in my heart that this terri-ble tragedy is giving and will give good fruit because it is good blood that was spilled. This event is to tell us some-thing, and to give us pause. I still believe, without understand-ing all of this, that the ALL of the sisters will be for our good and for the glory of God. Their lives help us understand the true joy of being a Xaverian Mission-aries of Mary."
As a province we want to be and pray with our sisters, represent-ed in the Worcester community and tying us all with the entire congregation scattered world-wide. We will have supper and a special mass with friends of the sisters on October 2nd in Worcester, beginning at 4:45 pm, with mass a 7 pm. Fr. Joe Matteucig will preside.
He spake well who said that graves are the footprints of angels. ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Spring Provincial Retreat
May 24—29, 2015
Miramar Retreat Center
Duxbury, Massachusetts
With the Xaverian Missionaries of
Mary Sisters
Led by
Fr. Luigi Menegazzo, SX
In Celebration of the Missionary Lives of
Srs. Olga Raschietti,
Lucia Pulici, and
Bernadett Boggian
Supper on Thursday,
October 2nd, 4:45 pm at the Xaverian Sister’s
Community
Mass with friends at 7 pm in a local parish
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Crossroads Page 3
The council held serious and continued discussions on devel-opment and fundraising into the future. It comes at a time when all of our communities will be holding mission banquets soon, important ways to involve our friends in our mission.
Taking up the challenge of the last provincial chapter, Frs. Chudy and Puopolo attended fundraising workshops in Wash-ington DC and Providence, sponsored by the National Cath-olic Development Conference. The fruits of these workshops fueled further discussion on how to proceed from here.
The plan now is to have the council put together a draft of a possible working paper that could eventually be considered in a provincial assembly and then offered to our upcoming provincial chapter in 2016. The chapter would consider a way forward in the important work of development and fundraising as changes continue in our region.
Here are some interesting things to consider:
Despite the importance of internet, traditional mail continues to be the best fundraising tool, especially when linked with emailing.
Memorial Celebration with the Xaverian Sisters, Octo-ber 2 in Worcester, MA.
Holliston Mission Banquet, October 4.
Wayne Mission Banquet, October 5.
Franklin Mission Banquet, October 17.
US Catholic Mission Asso-ciation Conference, Arling-ton, VA, October 24—26.
Wayne Clergy Dinner, No-vember 4.
Founder’s Day, Nov 5. Provincial Council, Frank-
lin, November 11—12. Holliston Clergy Dinner,
November 20.
In an effort to ground interfaith dialogue work as a tool of mission animation, the council created an In-terfaith Dialogue Commission of the province in or-der that a group of confreres from across the province will be reflecting seriously on this matter. The coor-dinator of the commission is Fr. Michael Davitti. The commission also includes Frs. Adolph Menendez and Alex Rodriquez. Fr. Chudy will also participate to some extent.
Council Creates Dialogue Commission
Fr. Carl Chudy was recently elected to new roles in his presence in our name with the Conference of Major Superior’s of Men and the USCCB Na-tional Advisory Council. With CMSM, Fr. Chudy was elected to the Executive Board as an at-large member that oversees the work of the National Board. With the USCCB he was elected to the Executive Board of the National Advisory Coun-cil as the pro-active agenda chairperson.
What about increasing our doubling the amount of appeals we do within the year?
The traditional way of cul-tivating friendships over time will certainly continue but become less frequent. Future donors will give for a period and then fall away and new donors will always have to be at the crux of the work.
The donor base of persons 65 years and older is a pop-ulation that is increasing and thus there are more opportunities to invite new collaborators of to mission.
The Provincial Given New Roles at CMSM and the USCCB
We welcome Fr. Alejandro Rodriquez Gomez who comes to serve the mission of the USA Region from the Franklin Community. He will collabo-rate on the Global Youth Mis-sion team bringing the exten-sion of their work to the Mid-west. WELCOME ALEX!
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We share with you a summary of some discussion of the 11th Pro-vincial Council:
֎The General Direction asked us for ideas for the upcoming international mission animation gathering in January 2015 that includes our region, the UK, Spain and Italy. We already shared a number of concerns we would like to see met.
֎With the arrival of Fr. Alex in the region, we are planning a new strategy for the Global Youth Mission program. Fr. Alex should arrive soon.
֎Fr. Chudy reported on a settle-ment agreement made with Mr. Mielke, the second contractor involved in the Holliston re-building. A schedule of pay-ments made back to us are set up
for the next five years.
֎Fr. Chudy pre-sented a list of pos-sible ideas for the celebration of the Year of Consecrat-ed Life which be-gins November 29, 2014. There was an emphasis on collab-oration with our local dioceses and with the Con-ference of Major Superiors of Men in Region II. Some media plans were made through the Communications Board. Our provincial retreat next year will also mirror this occasion. With the guide given in the council meeting, superiors will discuss possible community plans.
֎Thailand requested assistance
Check out the latest on our new website and social me-dia network.
Xaviermissionaries.org
Facebook.com/catholicmissionaries
Twitter.com/worldcatholic
From the Provincial Council
New from the Media Office Prior to the council meeting, the Communications Board met. This board oversees the print and internet media activity of the province and replaces the older Editorial Board structure for the newsletter. Frs. Puopolo, Lalli, Salicone, and Chudy met, along with our Communications Director, Mary Aktay.
In our social networking, about 70 percent of those searching for us on the internet do so through mobile phones. The Media Office redesigned our two e-newsletters, Xaverian Factor and Across Borders to be more easily accessible to iphone users. Along these same lines, the website on our Founder (guidoconforti.com) was made into a mobile friendly site as well, along with a special Xa-verian app. Another mobile
for a possible vehi-cle. The council iw willing to assist with this partially and we will en-courage our con-freres there to seek other sources of funding.
֎The council de-cided to assist our confreres in Sierra
Leone with the issues surround-ing the Ebola crisis, particularly in the quarantined areas. The shrine in Holliston collected funds from our friends there and the province added an additional amount.
֎Fr. Chudy that we successful-ly completed our yearly compli-ance with Praesidium in our ef-forts to protect young people.
friendly site based on our main website is under construction at the moment.
Among other issues that includ-ed a remake of the Rosary Booklet and a postcard type handout, we also talked about a media project for the Year of Consecrated Life. There will be special themes treated in the upcoming issues of the provin-cial newsletter.
;In addition, the Media Office will oversee a new video project that focuses on our consecrated missionary life that could be available on the internet and use in the mission animation of the GYM and other community programming. Mary Aktay will oversee this project.
Finally, we discussed the possi-bility of the GYM overseeing a webinar program.
The provincial project, Com-mon Ground (Dialogue Among Atheists/Theists) con-tinues to gather steam with a regular group meeting monthly from our Provincial House. Recently Fr. Chudy and Mary Aktay have been coordinating a dialogue conference, together with the Humanist Department at Rutgers University in New Jersey that will probably take place in the fall of 2015.
