Currently on sabbatical in India, Fr. Jobe Abbass, OFM Conv. serves as the Delegate to the Militia of the Immaculata (M.I.) for the Our Lady of the Angels Province in the United States. In addition, Friar Jobe is a well respected, published Canon Lawyer and professor of Canon Law. In 2018, he released a 3rd Edition publication of KANONIKA 07 | ” Two Codes in Comparison.”
He writes, “As part of my sabbatical, I was invited to Bangalore, India to give lectures and the convocation address (January 28-29, 2019) at the Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram, Pontifical Athenaeum of Theology, Philosophy and Canon Law. After that, I was blessed to spend time with the friars of our Order’s Province of St. Maximilian M. Kolbe (India) who are building a new seminary complex in the area of Bangalore. What a joy to see the young and hopeful faces of our friars! They have 22 novices and, this June they expect to begin the new academic year housing the philosophy students in the building under construction in this photo. There will be rooms for 32 simply professed friars and 8 solemnly professed friars as well as guests. Situated on a three-acre property, the friary has room to grow and is well-situated; one kilometer from the long-awaited subway system for Bangalore.”
Pictured above, Friar Jobe (in green) with the Friary Guardian, Fr. Kuriakose Mattahil, OFM Conv. and six of the simply professed students who had just returned from classes.
Joseph HamiltonIndian Province Building for the Future
Among the many ministries the Friars support in Uganda is the John Paul II Technical Institute in Kakooge. Kakooge is a town in the Nakasongola district of Uganda, 55 miles north of Kampala, the country’s capital. A vocational school for both boys and girls, the John Paul II Technical Institute has around 100 students. All students live in a dormitory on campus and attend courses that will prepare them for their future professions. They can choose from areas like agriculture, carpentry, catering, computing, cosmetology, building, electronics/electrical, motor vehicle mechanics, tailoring, and welding. The full program lasts two years, but there is also a short program lasting three to six months, and a distance learning option, also.
Joseph HamiltonUganda Update: St. John Paul II Technical Institute
Born in 1957 in Gdansk, Poland, to a family of 8 children, Fr. Tadeusz Swiatkowski, OFM Conv. learned early in life that he might have a calling to religious life. Reading his parents’ issues of Immaculata, the magazine founded by St. Maximilian Kolbe, Fr. Tadeusz first heard the call to become a Franciscan Friar. Inspired by the life of St. Maximilian Kolbe, Fr. Tadeusz entered Minor Seminary and then Franciscan Novitiate, making his solemn vows to Franciscan religious life in 1981. Fr. Tadeusz was ordained to the priesthood in 1983.
After serving two years in the parish of Niepokalanow, and studying the English language in Manchester, England, Fr. Tadeusz departed Poland for the mission in Kenya. While there, his first major assignment was as Formation Director of Postulants. However, in 1988 he was assigned to organize and direct the construction of the order’s Major Seminary in Nairobi, Kenya. In 1989, with the Seminary completed, 30 Franciscan students of Philosophy and Theology started to live and study there.
Among his many accomplishments of that time was his role as Editor of the Kenya Mission’s magazine, Messenger of Mary Immaculate. Modeled on St. Maximilian’s magazine, Knight of the Immaculate, the Messenger of Mary Immaculate presented the Marian spirituality of St. Maximilian Kolbe to an African audience.
In 1989, Fr. Tadeusz was elected Provincial Delegate for Kenya and Rector of Nairobi Seminary. Continuing his work as Editor of the Messenger of Mary Immaculate, Fr. Tadeusz assumed the role of Vocation Promoter for Kenya, while also starting to organize a new parish community complete with construction of a new church and friary building located in Limuru, 40 km from Nairobi.
Fr. Tadeusz, seated left, and Fr. Zenon Garus, OFM Conv., seated right, spend time at the street children home attached to the parish in Limuru. The home provides shelter, food, and education for 60 orphaned children living on the streets. Served by the Sacred Heart sisters as well as the Franciscan Friars Conventual, the street children home helps children have health and security in life, and provides support all the way through university study and job placement.
Recalling those early days of the mission, Fr. Tadeusz said, “It is interesting that at that time we had only one vehicle, a Toyota pick-up truck, which I used for daily transporting of students to the seminary, for shopping and also pastoral activities 40 km away in Limuru. When I think of it today, I wonder – how was it possible? God is great!”
As a missionary in Kenya, Fr. Tadeusz began visiting the homes of parishioners, a practice common in his native Poland but uncommon in Kenya. In the course of six months from when he started, Fr. Tadeusz visited 900 families. After this journey, his understanding of the struggles and joys of the Kenyans he served was transformed. One day after preaching a homily inspired by his new understanding of life in Kenya, an elderly woman in the parish gave him a big hug and proudly commended him for finally speaking like a Kenyan! Of this experience, Fr. Tadeusz said, “We can only work there if we know the people. You have to find ways to know them so you can help them.”
In 1998, Fr. Tadeusz was nominated to the office of Secretary General for Missionary Animation for the whole Order. In that position for nine years, Fr. Tadeusz travelled extensively strengthening and promoting Franciscan missions around the world. In 2007, Fr. Tadeusz was elected the General Assistant for Africa, a position on the Order’s leadership board that allowed him to focus on developing the Order’s missions in Africa, a continent that is very close to Fr. Tadeusz’s heart. As General Assistant for Africa, Fr. Tadeusz serves as a link between the Minister General, the Order’s leader in Rome, and the Order’s missions in Zambia, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Burkina Faso, and Malawi.
Hoping to return one day to missionary work in Africa, Fr. Tadeusz reflected on what makes Franciscan missions special: “This is our characteristic: we are supposed to be with the people. Our parishes are supposed to be Franciscan parishes, meaning it’s not myself who works only, but we are working as a community. So people will know that we are a community and we help them to be a community, also.”
Joseph HamiltonFr. Tadeusz Swiatkowski on African Missions Today
The Friars and people of Sri Lanka are grateful to the Franciscan Mission Association for making the new Formation House in Kandy possible. Completed in 2016, the new Formation House in Kandy is a Pontifical Faculty, serving as the Post-Novitiate site for the friars’ Philosophy and Theology studies. Through the generous support of friends and benefactors through an online campaign, the Franciscan Mission Association also paid to ship over 5,000 theology, philosophy, spirituality, and history books donated by the Friars of the Our Lady of the Angels Province in the United States. In April 2016, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., Minister Provincial of the Our Lady of the Angels Province, traveled to Sri Lanka to attend the blessing of the new Formation House in Kandy.
The friar-students hand made a welcome arch out of coconut palm fronds. The new Formation House was formerly a hotel with four stories which will ensure that the Friars will get ample daily exercise.
The Minister Provincial of St. Maximilian Kolbe Province in India, the Very Reverend Fr. Leo Payappilly, OFM Conv. (right), hosted our Minister Provincial, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv. (left), throughout his visit. The Indian Province established its first mission in Sri Lanka seven years ago.
The elaborate “Inauguration” ceremony included lighting candles on a candelabra made by the friars out of the trunk, fronds, and flowers of the coconut tree. As the ceremony progressed, the big moment came for the cutting of the red ribbon – an honor accorded to our Minister Provincial. Bishop Fernando blessed each room of the new Friary, beginning with the Chapel.
The Minor Seminarians from the Mission’s formation house in Katana (Colombo) made the four-hour journey to Kandy to participate in the festivities (pictured in the Chapel). On the second day of the celebrations, Sunday the 24th, Fr. James celebrated the first Mass in the newly inaugurated and blessed Chapel, and afterwards processed outside to bless the Grotto of Our Lady, which the seminarians themselves had constructed. Fr. James left a donation for the friars to get a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, which will eventually the grace the new Grotto.
In a noon time ceremony outside of the Shrine of St. Anthony, our friars who serve on the Province Definitory, and FMA/Companions of St. Anthony staff members, joined our Minister Provincial, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., as he blessed the donated books prior to their departure to the year-old Franciscan Friars Conventual Formation House, named for the Sri Lanka’s first saint, the Indian missionary priest St. Joseph Vaz, who died in Kandy in 1711 and was canonized by Pope Francis during his 2015 papal visit to Sri Lanka.
On the evening of July 22, 2017 the delivery of donated theology books finally arrived in Kandy, Sri Lanka! the truck was unloaded with the help of 11 young friars in formation.
Joseph HamiltonFMA Continues Education in Sri Lanka
Early Conventual Franciscan vocations in Ghana, late 1970’s.
One of the early missions the Franciscan Friars Conventual began in Africa was in Ghana, West Africa. Started in 1977, the mission in Ghana would provide full-service healthcare and spiritual care for persons suffering from Hanson’s Disease, formerly known as leprosy, educational and vocational training, and many, many other forms of care and service to the people of Ghana. As with all Franciscan missions, in time local young people heard the call to Franciscan religious life. Responding to the need for formation in Ghana, the friars developed the St. Francis Novitiate and Spirituality Center in Saltpond, Ghana.
Early Conventual Franciscans in Ghana. Fr. Dominic Slemba is standing on the far right.
In 1977, +Friar Dominic Slemba, OFM Conv. was one of the first group of friars from the former St. Anthony of Padua Province (whose friars joined those of Immaculate Conception Province to create Our Lady of the Angels Province in 2014) to open the new mission in Ghana. From 1978 – 1984, +Friar Dominic continued his missionary work of forming new friars by serving as the Director of Novices, at St. Francis Novitiate, in Saltpond. +Friar Dominic then served as the Director of Formation and Guardian at the Our Lady of the Portiuncula Friary, in Cape Coast, Ghana until 1988 when he resumed his work in Saltpond, serving again as Director of Novices and then as a staff member of the Spirituality Center. In 2004, suffering from cancer, +Friar Dominic left his beloved Ghana and returned to the United States. Sister Death greeted him in 2006 after a long fought battle and he was buried in the Friars’ Mausoleum in St. Stanislaus Cemetery, in Baltimore, MD.
A major part of the friars’ ministry in Ghana was care for those suffering from Hanson’s Disease, then known as leprosy. Here, Fr. Dominic shares Communion with a leprosy patient.
As Director of Novices, Fr. Dominic formed many young men in their journey to Franciscan life. Here, Fr. Dominic oversees as then Vicar Provincial Fr. Alexander Cymerman, OFM Conv., receives the simple vows of a Ghanaian friar .
Fr. Dominic in a thoughtful moment in the friary courtyard. His impact on the Franciscan Order and the Church in Ghana is immeasurable.
At the request by those he served so faithfully, permission was granted for the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., Minister Provincial of the Our Lady of the Angels Province, to translate, or move, the remains of +Friar Dominic back to Ghana. The Memorial Mass and Interment lasted three hours, concluding under lashing rain at the grave-site in the “Franciscan Valley of Prayer and Silence.” Cardinal Peter Turkson, who serves as President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace in Vatican City, was the main celebrant. Cardinal Turkson was assisted by the Archbishop of Cape Coast – the Most Reverend Matthias Kobena Nketsiah, as well as the Custos of the Order’s Ghanaian Custody of St. Anthony – Fr. Anthony Bezo Kutiero, OFM Conv. and Fr. James. Not even the drenching downpour, as it was Ghana’s legendary “Rainy Season,” dampened the exuberant spirit of the day. A fitting summary can be found in the succinct and memorable words of the Archbishop: “Fr. Dominic was an American by accident, but a Ghanaian by Divine appointment!”
Before Mass, Fr. Dominic’s cremated remains reposed beneath the Tabernacle which he installed at the Saltpond Novitiate Chapel, while serving there.
Archbishop of Cape Coast – the Most Reverend Matthias Kobena Nketsiah, Minister Provincial of Our Lady of the Angels Province – the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., President of the Pontifical Council for Justice & Peace in Vatican City – Cardinal Peter Turkson, Custos of the Order’s Ghanaian Custody of St. Anthony – Fr. Anthony Bezo Kutiero, OFM Conv.
Procession of Friars, friends, and faithful honor the life and legacy of Fr. Dominic Slemba, OFM Conv.
Fr. Dominic Slemba, OFM Conv. in 2006 at the Shrine of St. Anthony in Ellicott City, Maryland.
Joseph HamiltonGhana Mission Celebrates 40 Years and Welcomes +Fr. Dominic Home
