During the last days of the past year, Father Anthony Banks, general counselor for the Asia and Pacific region, made a brief but fruitful visit to West Papua. He tells us more details upon his return to Rome.
"First of all, my presence once again among our Papuan brothers was to continue contacts for the West Papua Network, which I chair. These contacts, both here and abroad, work on issues of human rights and social justice in favor of a land immersed in perpetual and constant conflict. This is a region that experiences land dispossession, land degradation, and a constant drip of losses of self-determination."
"People are sometimes refugees in their own land while Indonesia continues to overwhelm the Papuan population with transmigration from other areas of Indonesia."
A vocational flourishing in the middle of the Pacific
The second reason I was in Papua was to closely follow one of the largest formation programs of our Order. We have 11 boys in the initial stages, either in community or experiencing village life in West Papua; another 11 in the novitiate and 35 students, with vows, studying philosophy and theology; in addition to six in ministerial and parish work.
Although they struggle with economic difficulties, our brothers have two wonderful schools in the city of Manokwari that particularly help families with children from the highlands gain access to better education and a better future. At present, these schools require external assistance both at the academic and residential level. To this day, their work and all construction development of the schools depend on foreign assistance.
Learn more about the work of the Order of St. Augustine in Papua through the Augustinians in the World Foundation, here: 70 years since the Order ventured into the jungle of West Papua to bring the Gospel
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