Seven novices (5 East Timorese, 1 Singaporean, 1 Thai) will be going for their six-week Pastoral Experiment from November 7 to December 19. They will be working as garbage collectors (for a Garbage Collection company) and as migrant workers doing landscaping work (i.e. planting grass, trees etc.) Some will live with the poor in a small one-room flat, while most will live with other migrant workers in their dire poverty-stricken living conditions.
This Experiment is the novices’ third and last Pastoral Experiment, and thus, the most challenging. The novices go through some weeks of discernment on the various options for their Experiment and then, submit their “discerned choices” (in priority) to the Novice Master for his decision. The novices have found this process of experiencing the Jesuit charism and way of proceeding very helpful because they experience themselves “owning” the final decision of the Novice Master (even if it is not of their choice). That is the novices are not simply being “told” where they are to be sent. This is because the Novice Master will explain the reason behind his final decision of the Experiment to them. One of the practical bases of the decision is apostolic constraint – i.e. amongst many limiting factors, not all novices can be sent to their apostolic choices because not all companies are willing to take all the novices at the same time.
Four novices (2 East Timorese, 1 Cambodian, 1 Singaporean) will begin their Long Retreat from November 19 to December 20. Please do keep them in your prayers. The Novice Master, Fr Philip Heng, will be directing them in the Singapore Major Seminary. The novices are given seven months of preparation for the Long Retreat, i.e. they join the novitiate on April 22 each year.