Not that Indiana

 The 4th Missionary Encounter of the Apostolic Vicariate of San Jose del Amazonas in Indiana, Peru.

As the only missionary from the USA at the above conference from August 5-8, I had the opportunity and privilege to meet 45 missionaries including laity, religious and clerics from 17 missions based in the Peruvian Amazon. The missionaries hailed from several countries — Peru, Mexico, Spain, Brazil, Colombia, Poland, India, and Canada. The invited speakers were from Lima (the Conference of the Religious Orders of Peru, and Kairos); they hailed from Peru, Brazil, Chile, Spain and the Philippines.

My friends were initially confused as to why the conference was being held in Indiana, assuming that it was in the USA! Just as there is a town called Peru in Nebraska, there is one called Indiana in Peru! This certainly aroused our curiosity as to the origin of the name Indiana, which is an hour away by boat from Iquitos. On arrival at the main plaza of Indiana, there is a commemorative plaque in honor of the first bishop of the Vicariate, Msgr. Damas Laberge, a French-Canadian Franciscan missionary, who founded the town of Indiana in March of 1948. He had named it after the city of Indianapolis in the USA. The rest is history…please see photo for the explanation.

 

We arrived on August 5th evening to the Vicariate’s administrative center in Iquitos, where we did introductions and had dinner together. The next day after breakfast, we went by bus to the Augustinian retreat center in Tagaste, for orientation and relaxation. Sr. Lucia Schulz of Brazil and Sr. Griselda Arciniega of Mexico  organized the ice-breaker activities. Later, there were sports activities, board games, music, dancing and a nice size swimming pool to unwind in. After lunch, we returned to Iquitos to take the boat to Indiana, where we settled for the evening at the Vicariate’s retreat center. Daily mass was held in the evenings in the small cathedral a block away.

On Sunday the 7th, the retreat began. Two excellent speakers from Lima, Sr. Lucia Schulz in the morning, and Fr. Nelson Mitchell of Chile, in the afternoon, spoke on the main theme, “Called to Synodality.”  This was the fruit of the encyclical letter, Fratelli Tutti (on Fraternity and Social Friendship) by Pope Francis on 3 October 2020. The Pope had declared: Synodality is what God expects of the Church in the 21st century. It involves mutual listening in which everyone has something to learn. This 2 year process began officially in October 2021, as The Synod 2021-2023 -- “For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation and Mission,”  which allows bishops to consult with their flock — from parishioners to priests — in a spirit of collaboration and openness. Pope Francis hopes that this Synod will encourage greater participation from the whole Church at the diocesan, national and universal levels.

 

On Monday morning of the 8th, we split into the 3 respective groups —laity, consecrated religious and clerics.  The laity group was led by Henry Vasques and Mayte Galarreta, a husband and wife team from Kairos in Lima. Henry gave an excellent lecture on “Synodality: Contribution to Consensus Building,” which elaborated in greater detail on the previous day's lectures; Mayte kindly translated for me what Henry was saying in Spanish. In the afternoon, the 3 groups reconvened for excellent lectures given by Lima speakers: Sr. Lucia, Sr. Isabel Miguelez of Spain, and Sr. Anna Manauis of Philippines, followed by several small group case discussions on the lecture topics of Violence, Exploitation and Human Trafficking which is highly prevalent in the Amazonas.

In summary, this was an intense conference (100% in Spanish) which reinforced the Pope’s teachings in Fratelli Tutti and challenged us as missionaries to greater participation in living out the Gospel and strengthening Synodality.