By Dan Finucane

I hope that this email finds you all well. I hope that it won’t be too long of an email – I have done my best to organize my thoughts beforehand, so that I can be concise while still offering lots of insight into life here. First, some pictures of the grounds here at the mission – the first is the friary (you can see the bright red-orange jacaranda trees in the background, which bloom at the driest point of the year here) and the second is my room.

"Today a light will shine upon us, for the Lord is born for us; and he will be called Wondrous God, Prince of peace, Father of future ages: and his reign will be without end."
(Christmas Mass at Dawn, Entrance Antiphon, Isaiah 9:1, 5: Luke 1:33) 

A very Blessed Christmas to all
in the Assumption Family!

On a recent Sunday in Advent, the eight Assumptionist novices came to the center in Brighton, MA for liturgy and the last “Conversations…” of the semester. A very culturally diverse group hailing from Guatemala, Ecuador, India, the Philippines, Mexico and the United States, they were joined by Fr. Richard Lamoureux, A.A., novice master,  Fr. Alex Castro, A.A. and Fr. Mulumba Matsongani, A.A., his assistants.

(Fr. Vincent Leclercq, an Assumptionist who teaches at the Catholic Institute in Paris, recently visited Vietnam. Fr. Vincent, who is also a medical doctor, earned a Ph.D. in medical ethics at Boston College several years ago and lived at the Assumptionist Center in Brighton. The following article which he wrote appeared in the October issue of the newsletter of the French province of Assumptionists.)