Dear Brothers and friends of the Alliance,

This letter is the fruit of long reflection on vocations in the Church and particularly at the Assumption. As we know, our congregation has always had a concern to serve as intermediaries of God’s bidding to men and women. The Kingdom that is at hand needs workers, whether they be priests, lay-people, religious, or consecrated persons. Our Rule of Life reminds us that we work « to support Christian vocations, particularly religious and priestly vocations » (#16). Three other numbers (#133-135) specify the demands of vocation ministry. Emmanuel d’Alzon tirelessly urged the Assumption to awaken vocations, saying that it was an essential apostolic priority of the Institute. Alumnates, the work of Our Lady of Vocations (Notre-Dame des Vocations), residences for young people, schools, chaplaincies at universities and at other educational institutions…. all of these demonstrate our family’s concern to reach out to young people and invite them to reflect on the meaning of their lives and to help them to find the right path under the Lord’s watchful gaze.

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“My friend, I am not cheating you.
Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?
Take what is yours and go.
What if I wish to give this last one the same as you?
Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money?
Are you envious because I am generous?”

The following is Fr. Dennis’ homily from Sunday Mass on September 20th.

The Gospel was the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard.

What makes this Sunday’s parable work is that God, in the person of the landowner, precipitates a crisis. Nothing much would have happened if the landowner had followed the usual course, paying the full-day laborers first and then, in turn, the workers who came later. Having received the agreed upon wage, the first group would have left the vineyard content that they had been treated fairly. They got what was coming to them. But instead, the landowner reverses the expected order and pays the latecomers first, giving them the full daily wage. Not surprisingly, those hired in the morning cry foul that these others, who were spared the searing heat of the midday sun, not to say the weariness of a full day’s work, were given the same wages.

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Yesterday the Kenyan Ministry of Education announced that, due to low Covid-19 infection rates, schools will not wait until January 2021 to reopen, as previously scheduled, but will open next month.

At Assumption High School - Nairobi we are busy with renovations required by government regulations for a safe reopening, including the installation of additional water points for hand washing, setting up classrooms and dormitories for social distancing, and ensuring we have enough masks for all staff.

In addition, we are excited to announce that there will be five Assumptionists involved at Assumption High School this academic year:

Fr. Luc Martel – Director
Fr. Benard Odhiambo – Deputy Director
Fr. Moses Musavuli – School Chaplain and Counselor
Dn. Kennedy Sakawa – Resident advisor for male students
Br. Kizito Juma Shebella – Resident advisor for male students

Their presence is a sign of our continued commitment to the flourishing of Assumption High School and all of its hardworking students and staff. May God bless and protect us in the year ahead.

Homily for the Mass of the Holy Spirit and Celebration of Assumption University

Chapel of the Holy Spirit, September 6, 2020

Very Rev. Dennis Gallagher, A.A.

Scripture readings: Ezekiel 33:7-9; Romans 13: 8-10; Matthew 18: 15-20

“If your brother sins [against you], go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again, [amen,] I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”

I hesitate to say this, but the Gospel today is about protocols. Oh no, not that. Maybe we should agree to retire this word from the language once the pandemic has left us.

But these are protocols not for the purpose of keeping people safe from physical disease, but for keeping intact the bonds of charity that bind the members of the Christian community to one another. Those bonds have been at least temporarily weakened by one member’s sinning against another.

So how do you proceed, what are the protocols? It’s quite interesting how specific this is There are three steps: first, take up the matter, one on one with the person himself; if no reconciliation comes from that, you bring in one or two others as witnesses; and if nothing comes from that, then you bring the matter to the whole church.

A couple of thoughts on this ...

At each of these levels, an appeal must be made to something that all the parties involved understand as binding them together. This is a community that is centered in Christ, who is the measure for everything that takes place in the community.

The other thought is in the form of a question: why go to this bother for one brother who has sinned? Through this rather elaborate protocol? Because much is at stake here, there’s a great good that needs to be upheld: that’s the unity in the community and by extension the good of the offending brother whose own well-being is tied to being a full member of this community.

So, does this have anything to do with what we are celebrating today, Assumption’s becoming a university? Well, let’s see… Unity… university…. There must be something.