Editorial - Life conquers death

02 MAY 2009, GEORGETOWN, GUYANA.
Two Guyana Jesuits are ordained deacons
Rev Marlon Innis and Ronald Fernandes two Jesuits attached to the Guyana Region will be ordained to the office of
deacon on Saturday May 2. The ceremony will take place at the Church of the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street,
London, United Kingdom. The ordaining Bishop will be the Rev George Stack, Auxillary Bishop of Westminister.
Marlon is a Guyanese while Ronald is from India. Both men have been in the U.K for some time now.
Ronald is originally from Karnataka Province in India and came to Guyana working for a year in Berbice.He
is presently doing his theology at Heythrop College, London.
Marlon was born in Mabaruma, in the North West. He attended school and later taught at Mabaruma. After
doing his teacher training programme at Cryil Potter College, he returned and taught for two more years at
Mabaruma, after which he came to Georgetown and taught at Central High for two years. He did a year’s study at the
University of Guyana, before joining the Jesuits. He too is now studying theology in the UK.
Ordination is the sacramental ceremony in which a man becomes a deacon, priest, or bishop and enabled to
minister in Christ’s name and that of the church. There are three ordinations in the Sacrament of Holy Orders:
diaconate, priesthood and episcopal.
Usually about six months to a year before ordination to the priesthood, the man is ordained to what is
sometimes called the ‘Transitional’ Diaconate, so named because he is in transition to the priesthood, and to
differentiate from the Permanent Diaconate. The man makes promises of celibacy and obedience to his bishop. It
signifies the movement of a man from the lay state to the clerical state.
The ordination ceremony includes various rituals, rich in meaning and history, for example , the prostration, laying on
of hands, anointing of hands, giving of the chalice and paten, sign of peace.
Another Labour Day:
Viewpoint by V. Parvatan
WORKERS UNITE! That has been the plea for decades, recognizing that in unity there is strength.
The history of the Trade Union Movement in Guyana is enriched by the contributions of many stalwarts who
championed the cause of workers at a price of personal sacrifice.
One who is always remembered and spoken of is Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow who is described as the Father of the
Labour Movement.
Given the many laws which now exist to protect workers and recognizing that in spite of those laws, there are
difficulties and barriers which some workers and their leaders face, it is easy to picture the scenario in years gone by,
especially in the colonial days.
The right to be paid for services rendered, irrespective of the amount or nature of job, is a great stride and an
advancement for workers after the sad periods of slavery and the indentured system.
Today, as in most parts of the world, independent states exist with workers having freedom to join Trade Union
Movements and having laws entrenched in the constitution to protect those workers.
Over the decades, so many things have changed for the better; yet millions of people in different lands live below the
poverty line. Their daily lives are surrounded by hardships, hunger, want and even in some cases, sub-human
conditions.
Through the medium of television, we see in some lands human beings including children, facing starvation. Some of
the root causes are not only the inequitable distribution of wealth but conflicts within countries of ethnic, tribal and
other forms. In the war zones, life is cheap. Many die from bullets, while others die from hunger and lack of medical
facilities.
Many economic systems and ideologies would boast of the relevance and effectiveness of what they advocate. But the
end result in relation to the advancement of people, improvement in their quality of life and access to health care,
education, basic food items, shelter and the like, are often lacking.
WHILE POLITICIANS AND TRADE UNION LEADERS FIGHT FOR POSITIONS OF POWER AND
AUTHORITY, THE SEEDS OF PROSPERITY ARE NOT FINDING FERTILE GROUNDS. THE GAP BETWEEN
THE RICH AND THE POOR WIDENS AND THE POOR SEEMS TO BE GETTING POORER.
Much more has to be done to alleviate suffering. There is need to minimize and possibly eliminate the scourge of
hunger which plagues the lives of so many people.
The current global economic crisis has highlighted the vulnerability of workers even in affluent countries, wherein the
security of their jobs, homes and assets are eroding and they are left to face an uncertain future and possibly join the
band of unemployed and homeless, categorized as the poor and the suffering.
Every country has its own peculiar situation and national leaders must, with purposeful unity, give priority to raising
the standard of living for those who daily have as their companion, hunger, misery and want.
This demands much more than speeches and marches. It requires an objective appraisal of the human dilemma and the
formulation of coordinated practical plans which could impact positively on the quality of life of workers.
Best wishes to all workers as they observe the traditional Labour Day.
Bahamas judiciary at ‘Red Mass’
Roman Catholic Archbishop of the Bahamas Patrick Pinder with the judiciary of the Bahamas on the occasion of the
"Red" Mass held at the St. Francis Xavier Cathedral. The Church in the Bahamas celebrates this annual mass specially
for the members of the Judiciary and the legal profession.
In his introduction the Archbishop explained that the tradition of the Red Mass goes back to the thirteenth
century. “We are informed that the first recorded Red Mass was celebrated in Paris in 1245. The custom eventually
spread to other European countries. The tradition got its start in England around 1310, during the reign of Edward I.
Members of the Bench and bar attended the Mass at the opening of each term of Court. The Red Mass invokes the
guidance of the Holy Spirit on behalf of those who administer justice that they may be endowed with ever increasing
clarity, wisdom and a renewed sense of mission and purpose in the performance of their vital responsibilities,” the
archbishop said.
A major theme of his homily this year was the issue of Capital Punishment a topic of increasing concern in
the region. In December last year the first execution since 2003 of an inmate in the hemisphere outside the US took
place in St. Kitts. Other territories are seriously considering resuming executions.
“ As we come then to the beginning of this new legal year, may all your efforts be blessed? Whatever the good
you do, however small or unnoticed, may it reflect in some way your awareness of being called for “the victory of
justice”. In the pursuit of the victory of justice may you all be guided and graced for the honour of your noble
profession and for the good of us all”’ the Archbishop prayed.
Jesuits in South Rupununi…
In this the second of three articles to mark the centenary of the Jesuits work in the Interior, Fr.
Simon Bishop SJ looks at some of the highlights of the past 100 years and how the work is growing
in the south.
The Jesuits first came to the south Rupununi in 1909, led by Bishop Galton, vicar apostolic of what was then
British Guiana, accompanied by Fr Cuthbert Cary-Elwes SJ. Fr. Cary-Elwes had been born in Boulogne, France,
where he spent his early childhood and, after being educated at Stonyhurst College, joined the Society of Jesus at the
age of 18. He was ordained at the Church of the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street, in 1900, and arrived in Guyana,
aged 37, in 1904. For the first five years he worked in Georgetown and in the Northwest District and then, on 19
November 1909, he headed up the Demerara River to join the Essequibo which finally, on 10 December, brought them
to the Rupununi Savannah.
The savannah had been the home, for at least two centuries of the Makushi and Wapishana Indians, divided
more by the east-west line of the Kanuku Mountains than by the north-south international border between Guyana and
Brazil. Fr Cary-Elwes had been keen to start up a mission far from the Brazilian border and nearer to the Indians but
the bishop wanted the mission to be nearer to the Catholic community in Brazil. So began the mission of Zariwa, St.
Ignatius – present day Lethem – which is still today the hub of the Rupununi mission and from where Fr Cary-Elwes
was able to head out to meet the Wapishana Indians.
So, it was that for 60 years, the Jesuits based at St Ignatius and then, later, in Sand Creek, would cover vast
distances to support and encourage the Catholic faith, embraced by the Wapishanas. Fathers Bernard McKenna SJ and
Manus Keane SJ began building a presbytery for a resident Jesuit community in 19698 but were barred from the area
by the then president, Forbes Burnham, after the Christmas rebellion of 1968 in which cattle ranchers and other
supporters protested against the president’s reclaiming of the land. It was not until February 1969 that a resident Jesuit
community was established in Aishalton, a fulfillment of Fr Cary-Elwes’ dream.
Fr Derrick Maitland SJ – a man trained during the war in motor mechanics – was the ideal choice, given the
amount of driving in such isolated territory, and he was accompanied by Fr Doc Loretz SJ, who took on the role of
local GP.
There are now four Jesuits living in the community of St Robert Mellarmine: Fr Amar Bage, the parish priest,
from the Ranchi province in Northern India; Fr. Paul Dominic, from the Andhra province; Jerry Dias, a scholastic
from the Karnataka province, who is doing his regency in the parish, and then Fr Peter Britt-Compton, like Fr CaryElwes an alumni of Stonyhurst College. It was very moving, therefore, as a former student of Stonyhurst College
myself, to be part of that extraordinary legacy, if only for a few days at the end of 2008. Maybe it is the lush quiet of
this ‘sweet especial scene, Rural scene, a rural scene, Sweet especial rural scene’ (Binsey Poplars, Gerard Manley
Hopkins, 1879) which, reminiscent of the Ribble valley, so attracted Fr. Cary-Elwes and Fr Britt-Compton to this
beautiful place.
Fr Amar arrived in Aishalton at the beginning of Febraury 2008 and, with the encouragement and blessing of
Fr Dermot Preston SJ, the Regional Superior, work was db\begun on constructing a larger and more permanent home
for the Jesuit Community. The building was completed ten months later, on 19 November – on the very day,
remarkably, that Fr Cary-Elwes had set off for the Rupununi, 99 years earlier – and was officially blessed and opened
on the feast of Christ the King.
In his address to the hundreds gathered for the opening Fr Dermot spoke of the presbytery as a house of prayer
and as a house of mission. He wanted the house to be a place where the Jesuits, individually and in community, would
come together to pray for the needs for everyone in their care and be strengthened and filled themselves with God’s
love and life, so that the, in turn, would bring God’s love and life to everyone to whom they ware sent. The home is
called, in Wapishana, ‘Wapadanaa’ – ‘our home’ – meaning not simply the home of the Jesuit Community, but the
house of and for everyone. This was in no doubt when, after the blessing, everyone, especially the children, took great
delight and pride in running all over the house!
However, it seemed, for a moment, that the house might be called by a different name … For, after all the
blessings, prayers and speeches about the houses and the Holy Spirit, the Amerindian DJ, who had been pumping
fairly anonymous Brazilian “musak” out over the campus, started the highly recognizable guitar riff for the beginning
of the Hotel California. I suspect neither he nor anybody else in the village (except perhaps Fr. Dermot and myself)
realised the suitability of he lyrics, it did not take long for the DJ to become bored with the record as he switched it off
half way through … but by then the imagination had been fired!
The house, the church, and the Jesuit Community, now supported and strengthened by the arrival of four
Ursuline nuns, also from the Ranchi area of India, are a wonderful sign of the Society’s and the Church’s commitment
to the people of the Rupununi. In my blessing of the house, I spoke of the Lord’s desire to come close to us, to make
His home in us (cf. John 8:31-2; 14:23; 15:4): ‘Behold I stand at the door of your heart, knocking; if you hear my
voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me.’ (Rev. 3:20) I was overwhelmed by
the warmth and generosity with which the people of the Rupununi had opened their doors and their hearts to me. I am
so proud and so delighted that the Church and the Society of Jesus – 100 years on – continue to open their doors and
hearts to the people of the Rupununi.
It was with a deeply grateful and sad heart that I left the people and place of Aishalton. I thought I might have
struck lucky when, on my return journey with jerry Dias and Percy, the parish’s expert driver, we arrived at the river
Rupununi only to discover that it had rise too high to cross by jeep and there was no one around to make use of the
pontoon – the ferry made from disused barrels to carry vehicles across. “Would it be best if I wade across?” I asked
Percy. “Not only would that be the best way, Father,” replied Percy, “it is the only way!” wading through the
Rupununi, with my bags held high above my head, it seemed the perfect ending to my visit – a kind of baptism into
the people and country of the Rupununi. I had ‘checked out’ but I truly wished I might never leave.
(Taken from the Spring issue of Jesuits and Friends Magazine)
Family Page By Chris & Noelma Lam
We were in a conversation with a young couple at the church fair last week, and he (jokingly) complained that
she is so jealous that he is afraid to even glance at another girl, for fear that she will become enraged.
Why do we get jealous?
What causes jealousy?
Out of curiosity we went on the internet and found this interesting bit of advice. Unfortunately, we do not
personally know the couple, so we are hoping that they will be reading this.
If you’ve got strong feelings of jealousy, it’s probably a sign that you don’t have enough trust in your partner
that he or she is being faithful to you. That lack of trust may be prompted by one of four factors.
We may feel insecure about our self-worth. In these cases, either you’ve been raised to believe, or some part
of your inner self feels, that you just don’t measure up. Because you don’t love yourself, you can’t believe that others
would love you, so you live in fear that your partner’s “true” feelings will be revealed and he or she will leave.
When you first connected with your partner and looked into their eyes, it felt like he or she was the only
person in the room. As you get deeper into your relationship and call yourselves a couple, the realization hits you:
You and your partner are not alone on this planet. There are others! Are they a threat?
When we are in a committed relationship, we assume the connection we have with each other will be strong
enough to fend off outside threats. In some ways, this “you-belong-to-me-and-I-belong-to-you” mentality is sweet;
it’s the stuff of pop songs and poetry. But sometimes the intensity of that connection is too strong.
When one partner sees everyone whom his or her partner comes into contact with as a potential threat, it is a
sign that jealousy has taken hold. Shakespeare called it “the green-eyed monster,” and once it gets a hold of a
relationship, it sinks its teeth in and can rip it apart.
You’re prone to cheating on your partner — maybe even have done so. Knowing what you’re capable of, you
project that behaviour onto your partner.
Your mate is cheating on you. Cheating doesn’t have to include sex; it often has to do with making emotional
connections to others outside the relationship. If your partner is sharing things about your private life with attractive
members of the opposite sex, it robs a sense of intimacy from your relationship and leaves you feeling vulnerable.
Establish safe boundaries within the relationship. You and your partner haven’t yet figured out how to
establish safe boundaries within the relationship.
Having a tight bond is about building walls around your love with windows that allow others to be part of it not doors where competing lovers can walk right in and disrupt your home. Because you don’t know what’s
permissible within the relationship and what’s not, you’re constantly on your toes.
Put your focus on building trust
Knowing the factors that lead to jealousy is an important first step to getting things fixed. If you’ve got some
growing up to do, therapy may help. Both of you have to learn how to set boundaries in the relationship. That
requires respecting your mate’s definition of limits of outside relationships from the start.
Over time, as trust builds, you and your partner can redefine what feels safe for the relationship. After all,
when you’ve got a great relationship, you want to share it with the world.
Memorable Holy Week at Malgretout
From Michael Kishore
Following the wonderful Palm Sunday procession and Mass at the Church of the Assumption Hague, West Coast
Demerara, Fr Anil Tirkey SJ officiated at all of the Holy Week Masses and service in West Demerara. The Good
Friday service at Hague was done by Fr Preston SJ the Regional Jesuit Superior.
At the Holy Thursday Mass at Malgre Tout Fr. Tirkey stressed the profound significance of the washing of
feet and the institution of the Holy Eucharist. He emphasized that ‘the first and most essential part is to let the Lord
wash us as Jesus said to Peter “unless I wash you, you have no share with me (John 13:8) and that after this we must
go and wash the feet of others’ that is to serve others regardless how unfortunate they might be.According to Father,
Jesus has provided us with the Eucharist … ‘to be refreshed in body and soul…’ to continue our upward journey
toward God and so that ‘we would not forget Him’ – among other things.
At the Good Friday service at Malgre Tout Fr Anil confidently asserted that ‘the message of the passion of
Jesus is to live passionately’ He further asserted that ‘we are free because of Christ’s love for us’ and that if we don’t
understand that His sacrifice brings us the great gift of freedom, we miss the greatest joys of Christian life…’
According to Father ‘only passion, great passion, can elevate a human soul to great things’ and that ‘this was true of
Our Lord Jesus Christ who had one passion in His life, and cause to live for and that was to save us from our sins and
to reconcile us with God’. Father Tirkey eloquently stated that ‘in pursuance of His cause, Jesus made a full payment
for out sins on the cross when He uttered those deeply touching and unforgettable words “It is finished”.
At the Easter Vigil Mass at Malgre Tout Father Anil declared that ‘this is the night when Jesus burst the bonds
of death and came forth as a conqueror from the grave. This is the great Passover of the Lord. He is passing through
death to eternal life’.Father exhorted the congregation to carry the good news that ‘death leads to life, to our brothers
and sisters in the world’. Significantly, Fr. Anil baptized and confirmed Sister Camille Rose Silent the same night.
Fr. Anil later said the Easter Sunday Mass at Hague. In a very spirited and inspiring sermon he stressed that ‘the
resurrection of Jesus is the most important event of the Christian religion’. Father further declared that ‘Jesus not
through death but through the resurrection has changed the world’. He confidently stated in his own inimitable style
that ‘Easter is the passing through of lent into the light of new life’ and that ‘victory was the message of the risen
Christ’. After the final blessing the lusty singing of the very rousing and triumphant hymn “My Lord, He died for a
Kingdom…. He has risen from His sleep, he lives again, alleluia” crowned a truly memorable Holy Week in West
Demerara – thanks very much to Father Anil Tirkey SJ and Fr Preston SJ.
This was immediately followed by a warm and joyful exchange of Easter greetings!
Religious Ed Department Relocates
The Religious Education Departmentof the Roman Catholic Diocese which was housed at the CCY building, 293
Oronoque Street Queenstown, has now been relocated to the Second Floor of Our Lady of Fatima Presbytery, North
Road Bourda. The office re-opened for business on Monday20 April.