In each issue of our quarterly magazine, we include a recurring theme that dovetails with the work of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers education program Discover Your Neighbor. The theme for the Summer issue is “Going Forth.” As a mission movement, that is certainly what Maryknoll does, all year long.
Our cover story epitomizes this mission spirit. In journal form, “A New Mission Presence in Chad” chronicles the joys, trepidations, frustrations and even tragedy of four Maryknoll sisters who set out last year for the Central African nation.
We also explore the mission journeys of Maryknoll seminarians undertaking overseas training in Bolivia. The young aspirants to the priesthood serve people in the city of Cochabamba and in remote Indigenous communities of the Amazon. Managing Editor Deirdre Cornell, who visited the seminarians last year, also writes about the ministry of one of Maryknoll’s newest priests, Father Gregory McPhee, ordained in 2020.
Going forth to mission can mean martyrdom. In 1976, Maryknoll Father William Woods’ small plane went down in a suspicious crash in the Guatemalan jungle. Meinrad Scherer-Emunds revisits that tragic event from the perspective of a young lay missioner couple who had joined Father Woods as volunteers. The husband, John Gauker, was one of four passengers on the plane, none of whom survived.
Going forth to live the Gospel is a risk, an adventure and a challenge. Yet, as Father Joseph La Mar says in our vocation prayer, when God calls, “it’s tough to say ‘no.’”
Lynn F. Monahan
Editor-in-Chief
