On October 28-29, the Secretaries of our Assistancy came together for a two-day meeting at JCEAO Office with Fr. Adolfo Nicolás. Frs Pham Minh-Uoc and Tom Steinbugler also joined them.

After a short introduction on the development and events at the Assistancy level by Fr. Nicolás, each Secretary then shared data, events and development in his field of responsibility. Fr Riyo Mursanto shared on high school education; Frs. Cyril Veliath and Budi Subanar on works in dialogues with other major religions – Buddhism and Islam respectively. On the second day, Frs Paul Dass and Jerry Martinson talked about Social Action and Social Communications Apostolates.

Some points presented during the meeting got more attention and greater interest, such as coordination, training, animation, and consultancy. The question of how to prepare younger Jesuits for these apostolates was also discussed at some length.

At the end of the meeting, Fr Paul Dass showed the script of SPEX, a musical meditation of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, written and composed by Fr Dass himself. This musical will be performed in Malacca, at the foot of the hill where St. Francis Xavier’s Church stands, in the evening of December 2nd (the eve of the Feast of St. Francis Xavier) of this Jubilee Year. We eagerly wait to see the completion of this spiritual masterpiece.