Mission Month has been a wonderful celebration this year, as our parishes and communities throughout the Province joined with the Universal Church in refocusing on what (or who) Mission is and how we can strive to live it more fully.

Of course, Mission is God, the fount of all love, and as missionaries, both lay and religious, we are all spreaders and sharers of God’s love.

This month, we have joined Divine Word Missionaries across the world in celebrating the 140th anniversary of the Society’s foundation.

Anniversaries such as this remind us that as missionaries in consecrated life, we have both a rich heritage and a shared future. Engaged in Christ’s mission together, we are part of something much greater than ourselves.

This week, we are celebrating Migrant and Refugee Sunday – an event which is always close to our heart as SVDs, because migrants and refugees are so much at the heart of what we do.

Most of our ministries in Australia, New Zealand and Thailand have significant populations of migrants and refugees and we have identified ministry in this area as one of our top mission priorities.

One of the ways in which the SVD AUS Province has celebrated the Year of Consecrated Life has been to share on social media short videos of our confreres answering the question: “What do you love about being a Divine Word Missionary?”

The answers have, of course, been varied, but what has been even more interesting is that many common themes emerged, which included: sharing the Good News with others, living in a multicultural community and being open to God’s will in their life.

The past month or so has seen me involved in a number of large gatherings with people who are engaged in Christ’s mission in one way or another.

First there was the wonderful Mission: One heart, many voices conference in Sydney, followed by our SVD Provincial Chapter and just last week, the Catholic Religious Australia conference in Brisbane.

Those of us involved with mission in Australia and elsewhere are gearing up for what is sure to be a wonderful few days of reflection, inspiration and fellowship at the Mission: One Heart, Many Voices conference in Sydney next week.

The inaugural Mission: One Heart, Many Voices conference, held a couple of years ago, was a huge success, both because of the outstanding speakers, but also the rich diversity of people engaged in Mission who attended over the three days.

Some weeks seem more tumultuous than others, and this week, across the globe, we have witnessed much trauma.

I am thinking, of course, of the thousands of people who have died or been injured or left homeless in Nepal and surrounding areas in the avalanches and destruction caused by a major earthquake. I am thinking also of the two Australian men, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, who were executed in Indonesia for their drug trafficking crimes, along with six people from other countries.

As this edition of In the Word is published, we are about to immerse ourselves once again in the extraordinary experience that is Holy Week.

Of course for many of us, perhaps especially those of us who are priests, this is a busy time with all the various Masses, liturgies and commitments.

Blessed John Henry Newman famously said, “To live is to change and to be perfect is to change often”, and I think every missionary would recognise the truth in that.

As missionaries we are frequently asked to move to new ministries and take up new challenges, all of which require us to change. But we are not called to change for change’s sake. Rather we are called to respond to the promptings of the Spirit as we respond to need.

As we enter into the final waiting and longing for our Saviour to come this Christmas, it seems that the Prince of Peace has never been needed more in our world.

For those of us in Australia, we are mourning the deaths of the victims of the Sydney siege, while in Pakistan we saw the senseless slaying of school children, and conflict and violence continues in countries across the world. In all this turbulence we await the coming of the Christ child.