SS Arnold and Joseph

The centenary of a death is seldom commemorated, except in the case of an outstanding individual. The reason, I think, is fairly obvious. In the case of most humans, one hundred years after their death – with the passing of several generations – there will hardly be anyone left on the scene to remember them. But it is different when it comes to the founders of religious institutes and other great personalities, whose footprints remain clearly etched on the sands of time for centuries.

There will always be men and women willing to reaffirm the creative role of such people in history, willing to keep their memory alive. They contribute to a collective effort to reconnect with the legacy of such memorable personalities in ever new and ever relevant ways. Our decision to mark the centenaries of the deaths of SS Arnold Janssen and Joseph Freinademetz, I believe, acquires meaning against this background.

Arnold Janssen’s Abiding Vision
As I sit at my desk trying to stimulate my brain to conjure up something meaningful to say, something appropriate for the occasion on hand, my thoughts go back to an encounter I had with Pamela Avellenosa several years ago. Does the name ring a bell? She was the youngster whose miraculous recovery from a near-fatal accident in 1995 was accepted by the Vatican Congregation for the Cause of Saints as evidence of Arnold Janssen’s intercessory power, paving the way for his eventual canonization.

I met her in early 2003, a few months before the canonization. I was part of a group of Province Mission Secretaries and Superiors Delegate gathering for a zonal-level workshop in Baguio City in the Philippines. We met her as a group at the convent of the Pink Sisters in Baguio.

In a voice charged with emotion she narrated to us the sequence of events that elevated her onto the world stage (she was present as a special invitee at the canonization of Arnold Janssen and Josef Freinademetz at the Vatican on 5 October 2003). We listened with rapt attention to her first-hand report of the miracle story. In January 1995, while she was still a high school student, she went to visit relatives in Baguio.

On that fateful 2 January afternoon, in the company of some of her friends, a leisurely bicycle ride resulted in a freak accident. While negotiating a sharp curve on the road, she fell off her bicycle and sustained a serious head injury. When brought to the hospital, doctors took time to assess the damage done to her brain when her head hit the hard asphalt surface of the road. By the time they had figured out the seriousness of the situation, the bubbly teenager had passed into a coma. Subsequently they would write her off as a hopeless case.

It was at this stage that her grandmother learned the distressing news. She immediately rushed to the Pink Sisters’ convent and implored them to pray for the recovery of her darling granddaughter. The Sisters were most understanding and gave her a copy of Arnold Janssen’s novena. They asked her and the rest of the family to pray fervently, while promising her that they themselves would add this to their own list of intentions during the novena in preparation for the feast of their Founder.

Within a couple of days there was a dramatic turnaround in Pamela’s condition. By the time 15 January arrived, the feast of Arnold Janssen, the recovery was almost complete. The doctors were stunned by the nature and speed of Pamela’s recovery; they were convinced that it was medically unexplainable. The rest, as the cliché goes, is history.

Pamela believes that through Arnold Janssen’s intercession God gave her a second life. If her biological father had given her the first gift of life, it was as if Arnold Janssen offered her a rebirth. That is why she fondly calls him “Papa Arnold”. To put it in her own words, “…I was given a new life, a life far different from what I was used to living till then, yet a life that has more meaning, more faith, more love, and most of all, more God.”

Arnold Janssen has thousands of other spiritual children, and most of them hold him close to their heart with great respect and affection. There may be many among them who feel that they were given an opportunity to find new meaning in life by being drawn to his vision. However, not many of them would call him “Papa Arnold” or use any such epithets of fondness in referring to him. Yet most of them might admit that they have drawn abiding inspiration from the story of his life and his legendary commitment to the cause of the Church’s mission.

For Arnold Janssen’s innumerable admirers and for those who consider themselves the inheritors of his spiritual legacy – members of the three missionary communities he founded – the occasion of the centenary of his death is therefore a moment of grace, and it offers them another opportunity to reconnect with the legacy he has left behind.

Joseph Freinademetz as a Missionary Icon
In a similar vein we can speak of the other saintly figure – Joseph Freinademetz – whose centenary is conjoined to that of Arnold Janssen. Readers of his biography will instantly recognize him as a missionary icon of rare vintage. His total dedication to the cause, his overwhelming love for the Chinese, his conviction about an inculturated faith, and above all the remarkable sanctity of his personal life were the stuff of legends already in his life-time.

His triumph as a missionary was not the world’s usual triumph of strength, but rather of the cross – a triumph of vulnerability and love. His faithful living out of his call remains for succeeding generations a spiritual bequest. It is still capable of challenging us with immediacy and directness even a century after his departure from this world.

Reinforcing Our Commitment
A commemoration such as a centenary has the potential of fuelling collective memory and of taking people back to a period in history when a Spirit-led person or persons delivered a vision that is inspiring and exemplary. In observing the centenaries of the death of these two formidable men of action, Arnold and Joseph, that is precisely what we seek to achieve.

Regardless of their particular setting, the core of their vocational journey has been an unwavering trust in the providence of God and a profound desire to participate in God’s mission. These are values perennially useful for sustaining the vitality of a missionary call. Therefore the occasion offers us an invitation to effect some kind of transformation – no matter how inadequate – in our own lives, so that our claim to be committed Christians may come to possess a slightly more pronounced ring of credibility about it.



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