Life at the Seminary

Yes… this caught me off guard. Two weeks ago the weather was pretty much like we’re used to it back home. A few warmer days, 15 degrees… and then, bam, suddenly we find ourselves in the midst of a snowy Edmonton! I have been told by the Edmontonians that this isn’t normal for them either. Winnipeg suffered from a real snow storm today. As for me, I have been enjoying the view out of my window today. There isn’t much to see except for some trees. But it just seemed like the Big Guy had turned around the snowglobe and all the snow flakes came down… such a pretty sight!

 In other news, several midterms are coming up, the first coming Thursday. Midterms are good. They cut the amount you have to study for in half pretty much. It also means that we are mid – term. In less than two months, the semester will be done and over with. A weird idea if you ask me.

Dear friends,

As I am writing, we are in the midst of a several day International Harp Contest taking place in Tel Aviv, Israel. This contest is one of the most prestigious in the world, if not the most prestigious. Contestants come from all over the world This year we have two Dutch entries (Remy van Kesteren and Marianne Smit) and one Canadian (Valérie Milot). My friend -and previous winner of the Tel Aviv contest- Gwyneth Wentink will also be playing as one of the gala guests. Enough exciting things to make me wish I could be in Israel right now!That said, I am eagerly looking for a harp for myself to play in Canada. It was a little too expensive to bring my own beautiful orchestra harp all the way from the Netherlands, so I am looking for a generous person here in Canada that would be able to lend me one for this year. I have tried all sorts of ways to find someone that might have a harp they are not using at the moment, but no luck so far. And if you don’t have one, please join me in praying to God to ask Him to provide for one!!

If you want to enjoy the harp and the atmosphere at the Tel Aviv contest for yourself, take a look at the beautiful clip. Gwyneth is also interviewed for a few seconds Enjoy!

Apart from “Life at the Seminary” posts, you might also find some more personal posts here on my blog, in which I express some personal thoughts on life in our Church or even life in general. Today, I’d like to make a small post on ‘pro life’. What we mean with pro life is that we don’t kill off our children because they come at inopportune times in our life or our elderly, because they feel they have become nothing but a burden (ie. what we call abortion or euthanasia).

Some of you might have followed the death and funeral of Mr. Ted Kennedy, a pro-abortion ‘catholic’ U.S. Senator. What does being a Catholic really mean anymore? Are we glad just to have a politician call himself that, or do we expect him to actually stand up for the tens of thousands of children that are being murdered each year? Can we be Catholic if all we do is work on social justice?

I heard of the death of Mr. Robert Schindler, Sr., last month, one of the leaders of the pro-life movement. He was buried in Philadelphia without the fanfare or accolades, without the cable news networks broadcast, no cardinals did attend it, and the President of the United States did not deliver the eulogy – thank God. Mr. Schindler, however, is promised a better send-off than that. God Himself will him speak to him words spoken to all the suffering righteous: “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your Master.”

Bob Schindler, unlike Mr. Kennedy, was not rich, did not enjoy the high social status and was ravaged by aggressive euthanasia activist lawyers who decided that his daughter was just not worthy of life because she was brain-damaged. He had to fight the son-in-law who, despite a father’s unconditional offer to care for his own daughter, rammed the euthanasia agenda home viciously, even triumphantly. I cannot begin to imagine the pain in his life.

In Canada, the battle against euthenasiais raging on as we speak. Parliament is about to vote on a law that might make the killing of the sick and elderly in our community a very real possiblity.  My bishop, His Grace, Mgr. James Weisgerber, has courageously sent out a message to all people of good will, in order to enlist your support (politically if you are in Canada, in prayer if you are anywhere else in the world) against this evil.

Why do people not have the right to end their own lives? In our society, we have lost the basic certainty in our hearts that every human being is 100% loved and wanted by God. Even if you don’t believe in God, many of you will agree that every human being is worthwhile. Jesus never asked whether someone was a sinner or a saint, wealthy or poor, healthy or ill, alive or dead. He came for everyone. We are all worth his life, EVERYTHING, in his eyes. For us, today, as disciples of Jesus (however weak and limited we may be), our duty is to be there for everyone. Many elderly or severely ill feel they are just a burden to their families and friends, reasoning: ‘why should they come out here for a pathetic excuse of a human being like myself? I cannot do anything here in this bed, and now I am just a burden to them as well.’ Their spiritual death is already a reality to themselves. So they reason: ‘why not actually die, instead of prolong the suffering for myself and especially others?’

If we could only reach out to all these souls, and let them experience how worthwhile they are, despite their condition, no one would have to think about euthanasia ever again. Maybe we can ask Bob Schindler, now in heaven with God, to intercede for us. I ask all of you to join me and countless Catholics across Canada to pray that the euthanasia bill does not pass!

As many of you know, I am now at a ‘new’ seminary. That is to say, I am in Edmonton in Canada and this is all quite new to me. What some of you might not know is that we are in transition. The seminary here was too small. In total, we’re 30 seminarians living here in Edmonton with another 10 on internship this year. Due to the construction of a ringway around Edmonton, the diocese was forced to sell the seminary and college (which now have been demolished) and build a new one. This year, we are only at a ‘temporary’ location. While everyone really got settled in their new digs, and we couldn’t ask for a better place, most guys that have been here longer to me are really looking forward to the new seminary that is being built as we speak.

I can’t help but say that I am getting more excited. For one, we had a lovely Gala Dinner, now over a week ago. With all respect for the Church in my native country (The Netherlands), I don’t think we would have been able to pull off what this diocese here pulled off pretty much on its own: a fundraiser for our new seminary. As seminarians, we were granted the opportunity to spend a wonderful evening with 900 supporters of the seminary, who raised over 7 million dollars in one evening for this new seminary. I would like to invite all of you to pray for this new project, as we will need over 8 million more dollars over the next five years.

The good news is, they are already building our new seminary. Yesterday, news reached us of how they are working on our new chapel already. This will be one of the greenest buildings in all of Edmonton, and with state of the art technology they have been continuously pouring the concrete walls of our new seminary. The amount of work, money and PRAYER that goes into this project is amazing. And as a seminarian (and future inhabitant of this new building) it is an exhilirating time!

For those that are interested in the end result, there is a picture on the St. Joseph Seminary page that changes into sketches of several parts of our new building. Check it out!