You Suggest: Reflection on SFX Mission Trip to the Dominican Republic

The following letter comes to us from the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) in Mexico and the video below on the mission from EWTN:

The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter’s Mission Trip to the Dominican Republic this summer provided the missionaries who went with what can be considered an authentic taste of Catholic missionary life.  Man is a being of invaluable dignity created in the image and likeness of God and is composed of both body and soul. Catholic missionary activity should therefore recognize man’s bodily and spiritual needs.  

This missionary trip strove to provide missionaries who came from all parts of the United States (and some even from Canada and England) with the opportunity to serve people of the Dominican Republic in this capacity.  We brought them clothes, we helped build cement floors for a number of families, we even dug a latrine for a school in a small village.  All of these works, however, were secondary to the work of spreading the Gospel to these people and making the sacraments available to them.  

FSSP Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip now open for registration

Mission Tradition of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) is pleased to announce that registrations are now open for two different programs this summer.

The Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip is now in its 6th year. This year there will be trips to Mexico, Peru, and the Dominican Republic. These mission trips give young people and families the chance to practice the corporal and spiritual works of mercy and be enriched by daily Traditional Mass by FSSP chaplains. Please visit our new site website (here) and view the promotional video (here).

Support the FSSP Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip

        

Rorate has always been a proud supporter of these mission trips. Below, please see a short write-up, provided by a reader:

It is easy to get discouraged by all the maddening news that seems to come out about the Church on a daily basis. Especially for orthodox, conservative, traditional-minded Catholics it can be extremely frustrating when we get characterized as rigid, sick, or elitist. If you are not already aware of it, I want to draw your attention to an apostolate that both destroys these stereotypes and hopefully represents a real sign of hope for the future of the Church.

For five years now the Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trip of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter has been organizing missions for youth and families. On the one hand we could emphasize that these missions are rooted in the Traditional Latin Mass, but it may be better to simply say that these missions are grounded in the Catholic Faith, which has always had at its heart the Traditional Latin Mass. 

Help a new TLM community -- and build a grotto for Our Lady

We at Rorate have been honored to know the good priests of the relatively new Missionaries of Saint John the Baptist and to spend time with them. The MSJB is a small congregation of traditional Latin Mass religious priests whose spirituality stems from the spiritual legacy of the 17th Century Congregation of the Priests of Mercy in France. They also travel the country giving compelling, traditional mission talks for Catholics who request them.

Now, fully established in the Diocese of Covington, Kentucky, they have purchased a protestant church and need help turning it into an oasis of tradition -- and to build a grotto for Our Lady that should prove a destination for Catholics from all over and to serve as "a cave of refreshment in dark times" (go here to see the church they've purchased and the renovations already made).

CLICK HERE TO DONATE NOW

Please see below for a note by the good Fathers, written directly to you, our dear readers:

No reservations about supporting this effort

Please see below and consider helping the Traditional Latin Mass flourish on this Indian reservation:

CLICK HERE TO  DONATE 

When the Church came to our reservation back in 1884, it has been said by one spiritual elder in our community, "It was really easy for Indians to be Catholic. There was so much that came natural to us. Like a priest praying to the East, we've been praying to east long before the Black Robes came to us." He also went on to say, "Then in the 60's the Church changed, and a lot of people left the church because they felt that the Church had lied to them. They said this was important and a part of God, then all of sudden it didn't matter anymore. Our people felt lied to, like the the white man has done so many times before."

Saint Francis Xavier Mission Trips 2016

For the last few years we've helped promote the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter's (FSSP) mission trips. Please see below for next year's schedule.

Church and State together for beauty and the good of Mankind: President of Gabon supports new Church for Traditional Roman Rite

Communiqué of the Presidency of the Gabonese Republic - January 20, 2015 

Libreville, January 20, 2015 - Thanks to the vision and the personal support of the President of the Republic, not only the Catholics of Libreville, but all Gabonese - known for their love of beauty and the arts - will soon enjoy a masterpiece of architecture at the STFO district: the parish church of Notre Dame de Lourdes and its façade decorated with blue tiles.

Help fund FSSP St. Francis Xavier Mission

For the last few years, Rorate has partnered with the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) to bring awareness to -- and help fund -- some of their mission trips. The FSSP has asked us to bring this set of trips to your attention.

 

 

St. Francis Xavier Mission has now opened registration for next year's mission trips.  We will have three trips: Mexico during Holy Week/Easter Week (Families and individuals 16 and up), Peru July 28-August 10, 2015 (Ages 16-21), and Peru August 14-August 24, 2015 (Ages 21 and up).

 

Run by priests and seminarians from the FSSP, St. Francis Xavier Mission is fully committed to the preservation and spread of the traditional Latin Mass.  Through these trips we are able to bring to the people of these countries the same Mass that their ancestors would have assisted at and in the case of the Cristeros of Mexico, the Mass they died for.  We hope that these mission trips will be the means by which a fire will be lit in the souls of the missionaries, especially the youth; a fire that will enkindle within them the desire to sacrifice themselves for the salvation of souls.  Hopefully, through their experiences on these trips they will return home with hearts full of charity and continue to have the missionary spirit in their daily lives.

So, help us continue spreading the Catholic Faith and forming more zealous soldiers of Christ for the future.  For more information and to make a tax-deductible donation please visit our all new website by clicking here or email us at [email protected].

 

In the Immaculate Heart of Mary,

 

[a seminarian of the FSSP]

Pomp and splendor in the liturgy: Priestly duty for the sake of salvation of others

The scriptures teach us that it is the duty of all to be solicitous for the salvation of one's neighbor, according to the power and position of each. The faithful do this by religiously discharging the duties of their state of life, by the uprightness of their conduct, by their works of Christian charity and by earnest and continuous prayer to God. On the other hand, those who belong to the clergy should do this by an enlightened fulfillment of their preaching ministry, by the pomp and splendor of ceremonies, especially by setting forth that sound form of doctrine which Saint Paul inculcated upon Titus and Timothy.

Leo XIII

Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae

January 22, 1899