Walking in a Franciscan's sandals

Guatemala open doors, even doors to the Alberta past

A Missionary's Musings

By FR. JACQUES JOHNSON

Everyone has been trying in different ways to make life easy for me and to help me adapt to my new environment. On top of the list is Father Gerry Lestrat whom I met some 45 years ago at the Oblate novitiate in Winnipeg. We became good friends and one day, years ago, I invited him to come and join me in Grouard, in northern Alberta, to set up Kisemanito Centre, a training program for young people that became a model for the Bible schools that are now multiplying in Western Canada.

A true brother

When Gerry left Grouard it was to answer a missionary call to Guatemala, Central America, where he learned Spanish and where he's presently leading the Oblate works in that country. He's a great missionary and an awesome support to boot. In various ways he's facilitating my insertion into what might become a new missionary venture for me.

One unexpected surprise and blessing that I experienced as I began to study Spanish in Antigua - the former capital destroyed by earthquakes in the 1600s - was entering into contact with another rich religious tradition, the Franciscan order.

Antigua is known for its language schools, some 60 of them I'm told, catering to foreigners eager to learn Spanish. I lived with a family for a few weeks, but it wasn't like home. Later, I knocked at the door of the Franciscan community and asked for a place to stay while studying Spanish.

The Franciscans welcomed me as a brother and I'm very grateful to them. This religious order started out in Italy with St. Francis of Assisi, one of the most holy and most charismatic persons to grace the Church's calendar of saints. The Franciscans spread out in most countries of the world and are ministering in one of the main churches in Antigua, St. Francis Basilica, in a city dotted with churches - many in ruins caused by violent earthquakes over the centuries.

Masses at Mass

I concelebrated at the evening Mass and was surprised to see 50 or more Franciscan priests celebrating the Eucharist presided by their provincial superior who hailed from Cuba. They were attending a meeting regarding their ministry in Central America.

Meeting these Franciscans, strangely enough, gave me the occasion to reminisce about my days as a teenager in the Peace River country playing hockey in the wintertime. I remember a hockey game I played where the goalie of the opposite team from McLennan, happened to be a future Franciscan priest living a few miles from my home town, Donnelly.

He shoots, he scores

Kevin belongs to a great religious order that has produced many saints and has been a forerunner of a life of simplicity, of community and missionary zeal. One of their members who spent most of his life in Antigua, Brother Pedro, was canonized a saint a few years ago. His earthly remains are held in the St. Francis Basilica in Antigua.

Brother Pedro is an important religious figure in Central America revered for his simple lifestyle, his abounding charity and his love of God. I had the privilege of concelebrating the Eucharist several times in that basilica.

Faith and devotion lived out simply and profoundly is at the heart of these people's lives and was witnessed in a refreshing way by the people I met, especially by the three teachers I had. I found it all so refreshing.

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