from
Mision Tres Ojitas, 30
September 2000:
Dear Friars, Family and
Friends,
May God's goodness and peace be with all of you. It's a couple months
since I last wrotel, and the feast of St. Francis is just around the
corner, so it's time for a letter.
I'm pretty much settled into the routine here in Tres Ojitos,
Chihuahua, and I continue to thoroughly enjoy the ambience and climate
here. The only sounds to interrupt the silence are the dogs and
roosters in the morning, a cow bawling at night, and sometimes a
tractor plowing or a chain saw felling trees by day. Warm days and cool
(becoming cold) nights make for good prayer, work, study, sleep...for
the novices and for me.
As for the novitiate year, the honeymoon is over! To say it more
positively the program is working and growing pains are evident:
novices spatting and not talking to one another; novices and their
director getting on each other's nerves:-); more importantly, all of us
discovering or re-discovering the hard work of conversion. In this
deeper confrontation, several guys are seriously discerning their call.
Please pray for them, and for me and our formation community.
One novice, Sergio, decided to leave earlier this week, principally
because of several significant health problems which make it impossible
to concentrate on and pursue his novitiate formation. I think it was
the right decision, but it's a huge loss for us because he is such a
good brother, servant, example, and a Capuchin at heart. Perhaps he can
associate himself with us in some close way in the future if his health
permits.
My ministry is generally limited to parish helpouts on weekends and a
weekly Mass and confessions for the Capuchin Poor Clares. In addition,
quite a few people visit us here for retreats and confessions. I've
enjoyed the parish work and find the local folks very supportive of us
and our formation programs. The people in the pueblos around here are
generally poor, but with fewer social problems than I found in Yecora
last year (alcohol, drugs, etc.). Here the greater suffering is so many
husbands and other family memers working "on the other side," that is
in the United States, because there's little work locally. Perhaps half
of the families in Tres Ojitos have the husband or someone else in the
family away for six, eight or ten months of the year.
The Capuchin Poor Clares in nearby Madera are a wonderful blessing to
us by their prayers, friendship and support for us and our young men in
formation. (Besides that, I have a reliable e-mail access at their
convent!) This past week we celebrated with them the blessing of the
cornerstone for a new convent. They're a relatively new community,
thirteen years here, and have fifteen sisters. But their present
convent was provisional and is quite small for their life and work.
Speaking of construction, we now have a plot of land in Monterrey, near
the diocesan seminary, and are drawing up architectural plans for our
friary and house of studies there. We don't have a timetable for the
project yet, but hope to begin post-novitiate formation in Monterrey
next summer, in the new friary or a provisional location.
More crucial than the building is personnel...so keep praying with us
for more missionaries; and friars, keep considering it. Some of you
know that Br. Anselmo left from Monterrey, on a leave of absence from
the community, so pray for him. The other two friars Ed O'Keefe and
Francisco Ramiro, seem to be doing well.
In Yecora where I was the last two years, the friars are well and we
have five new postulants. So it looks like I'll have a job at least for
one more year...if I do a relatively decent job.
Friars and the rest of you Franciscans at heart, Happy Feast Day for
October 4. And friars of Mid-America, blessings on all the chapter
preparations. I'm doing my homework!
Please pray for me, especially that I can help the young men in the
novitiate open their hearts and lives profoundly to the grace our
gracious God offers them this year. And know of my prayers, and a hug,
for all of you back home.
In that Love which is God,
Bill Kraus
from
Tres Ojitos, Mexico, October 3,
2000:
Happy Feast Day to you
all. How blessed we are in the heritage of Francis
and
Clare, and my prayer for all the Franciscan family is for our continual
conversion and renewal in the wonderful spirit of the Poverello.
It's been quiet in Yecora
today,
since many local folks are in the neighboring town of Maycoba, a
community we serve about an hour away, for the huge annual feast of St.
Francis Borgia. His feast was originally October 10,
then
moved to October 3, and the Jesuits who evangelized this area
established a popular shrine of St. Francis Borgia in Maycoba. Thus for
many years around here THE St. Francis associated with October 3-4 is
Borgia, not Assisi. So you can imagine we have our
work cut
out for us to reclaim our day! But I'm happy that we
had a
church half-full for the morning Mass, and a few people joined us for a
Holy Hour this afternoon too.
The other two friars are
away, David
in Maycoba and Anselmo at an all-Mexico Franciscan conference in
Monterrey. So the postulants and I are enjoying the
feast on
a lovely fall day, with good prayer and meals. Our duck herd was
getting too large, so we had a couple for
supper. But Mark
(Mance, who was here last year), we didn't use the orange sauce recipe
- we're waiting for you to come back and prepare this delight for
us! I cooked the ducks and made a stuffing a la
Mexico,
using half bread and half tortillas cause we had so many, and using
nopal (the fleshy part of cactus) instead of celery because there was
no celery in town. Turned out pretty good!
We have four postulants
this year, a
little smaller group than we expected but a solid and positive group,
thanks be to God. They come from various parts of
the
mission territoy, which is good news for our vocation outreach, and one
is Mayo indian, our first indigenous vocation. It's
quite
evident with this group that reading and study and silence are hard, so
learning basic study habits,. including reading and writing, will be a
major goal for our program. I'm directing the
postulants
this year, with the help of David and Anselmo, and so far so
good. With a smaller friars' community this year
it's a
challenge to have adequate presence to the postulants, but we're
managing. I limit my work in the surrounding Pueblos
to
Saturday and Sunday, so I can be here in the friary and local parish
during the week.
The reports from the
novitiate in
Tres Ojitos are positive, and I'm anxious to get over there for a
visit, probably in early December. Efraim, our
vocation
director who is also on the novitiate staff, will be coming here later
this month to plan some vocation weekends and other activities with us.
I'll close for now, with a
special
note of thanks to the Mid-America Province for your financial
contribution to our work here, and a promise of prayers for those of
you who will be on retreat next week in Victoria next
week. May love and prayers to all who read this
letter, and
I ask you to remember me also as you kneel before the Lord.
from
Mision Tres Ojitos, 8 Dec. 2000:
Dear Friars, Family and Friends,
Greetings
from Mexico, the land of the poinsietta. I hope you think of me and
whisper a prayer for me as you admire this traditional adornment in
your living room. Regular mail is always slow from here, and even
slower in December, so I beg your understanding of e-mail. I appreciate
this electronic opportunity to send you greetings and prayers in honor
of Christ's birth, and to thank you for your love and prayers. At this
time of Advent and Christmas, may the new life and hope of the Savior
Jesus be born in your hearts and homes.
Speaking
of Mexico and the U.S., I read an editorial the other day in the
"Heraldo," the daily newspaper from Chihuahua, that Mexico would be
happy to instruct the U.S. on how to hold a presidential election!
Interesting....how the tables can turn quickly. Actually it has been a
relatively smooth election and transicion here, especially given the
fact that it's the first change in party power (from PRI to PAN) in 70
years. The new president Vicente Fox began his term December 1, and
there's a good bit of hope here concerning more honesty, better
relations with the church, peaceful negotiations in Chiapas, etc. We'll
see. He started his inauguration day with a visit and reception of
Communion in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, a first in modern
times.
Locally
life is good, and Tres Ojitos continues to be tranquil. I visited
Yécora (where I lived my first two years in Mexico) two
weeks
ago, and in that busier and noisier milieu I was again appreciative of
having the novitiate here, with no taverns, trafficways or raucous
nightlife. There's not much new in the village, but many families are
delighted to welcome back home for the holidays their fathers and sons
and spouses who work in the United States, most of them in Colorado,
mostly in some kind of construction. Some are documented, others not.
Some will go back in a couple months, others have enough money to
sustain them now for a couple years, especially if they find at least
some part time work locally.
It
was
a good visit back to Yécora, for me and the novices, and we
helped welcome five new postulants into the community. They're group of
young men, and here's hoping that at least 3-4 of them find there way
here next year.
Meanwhile
here the novitiate program runs smoothly, now with three novices. Two
others have left, one for health reasons and the other after vocational
discernemt. So we're a community of eight now, with three (American)
friars, two Mexican brothers in temporary vows,and the novices. As I
write the vice-provincial and novice director of the Mexican
Vice-Province (Spanish friars) are visiting here, considering the
possibility of sending their novices here next year. It would be fine
with us, especially if they send a friar-formator along! We have the
space, since we're finishing the construction of the third floor of the
novitiate house, and it would be good to have a larger community.
In
our
third location, Monterrey, we (the Province of California) have
purchased some land near the diocesan seminary, where we hope to send
our brothers in post-novitiate formation, for philosophy and theology.
The architects are drawing up plans for the house of studies, and
construction will begin sometime in the late winter or spring.
Monterrey ia a very Catholic and modern Mexican city, with many
opportunites for studies, formation and apostolic work.
It's
been a tough year for me at times, working in formation in another
culture. Language is still a struggle, but the tougher challenge now is
to sort out in myself what are purely American values and expections
from those that are truly Gospel and Franciscan. Some of these changes
after 50 years are costly. Luckily the guys are pretty patient with me,
and I'm learning lots about myself and that multi-faceted term
"inculturation." It's good I didn't know the hard work ahead of time, I
probably would have chickened out.
We're
gearing up for Christmas with the two big religious celebrations in the
parish community, the Novenario December 3-11 in preparation for Our
Lady of Guadalupe, and the Posadas from December 16-24. Our time and
various fiestas will be divided between our own friary, the parish
community, and the Capuchin sisters in Madera. It's not been too cold
yet, but we had a nice snow (3-4 inches) a couple weeks ago. Our friary
grounds are lovely draped in white, and we hope Mother Nature does an
encore for the 25th.
I
continue to be grateful for e-mail and its connecting me with the
province, family and various friends, including a friend in Pittsburgh,
PA who got my address for our province web site and wrote me.....after
5-6 years. And I continue to be grateful for the support from "the
other side," as they say here. I'll see family and a few others of you
next month during a quick visit for nephew Chris Leon's wedding
(January 6). It'll be great to be in the Land of Oz for a couple days.
A
very
holy Christmas to you all. I send a hug and a prayer, and please pray
for me too.
Br.
Bill Kraus, O.F.M.Cap. (billkraus@compuservecom)
from
Mision Tres Ojitos, 12
Sep. 2005
Dear Friars, Family and Friends,
Peace and all good to you in
the Lord
Jesus and in St. Francis.
The novices have a workshop
this week,
with a guest teacher (Fray Juan
Miguel from the Vice-Province of Mexico), so I have a week free from
classes and a chance to catch up on some other matters. One of them,
very important to me, is to write a letter to all of you back home who
in one way or another are part of this mission. I appreciate very much
your support of fraternity, love, prayers, gifts, and a phone call once
in awhile, and I want to give you an update on our mission here.
Collaboration is in this year.
As the
United States, Canada and
Australia begin your common pre-novitiate and novitiate in Kansas and
Pennsylvania, we here in Mexico have begun collaborative formation on
the levels of the second year postulancy and the novitiate. Three
jurisdictions have joined together: the vice-province of Mexico, the
vice-province of Texas, and our mission of the California Province here
in the north of Mexico. Texas has sent its young men to Mexico for
formation for a number of years, because their (Texas) candidates are
almost exclusively bi-lingual or Spanish-speaking, and because of the
bonds both vice-provinces have in their common mother province,
Navarre,
Spain. For our mission this is our first year common formation.
So we have here in Tres Ojitos
this year
eight novices: four for our
California mission, three that belong to Texas, and one for the
vice-province of Mexico. In addition - and for this I am supremely
grateful! - Mexico sent us a friar to be assistant novice director,
Eusebio Hernández. We’re ten, then, at the present
time: eight
novices, Eusebio and myself. Jim Doyle, our octogenarian from
California, is still in California receiving some therapy for his leg,
after a broken hip and replacement last winter. I don’t know
when he’ll
return, but we miss him and I hope he can get back here before winter.
Who else will start the fire in the chimney every night?!
Eusebio is Mexican, so
it’s the first
time we’ve had a Mexican friar
doing formation here in Tres Ojitos. Previously we’ve all
been
Americans (sic!) or Brasilians. It’s great having Eusebio
here, he’sa
good formator, I like working with him and he provides an important
cultural solidarity with and Mexican affirmation for the novices. But
it’s also a new experience for me, and a new challenge. With
Jim away,
I’m now the only non-Mexican in the house, and the only one
who doesn’t
share their history and culture.
So fraternal conversations,
especially at
table, dealing with Mexico’s
past - historical and political events, songs and movies and television
series, church and religious affairs - leave me isolated and
marginalized. But it’s a positive loneliness, in that as a
mission we
can form Capuchins ever more Mexican!
The program is going very well,
thanks be
to God. We had a month-long
"convivencia" (a pre-novitiate experience) of the group in April, so in
July we began with a good sense of community among the novices. Six
weeks into the program, the spirit is positive and I think
we’re all
growing together. Eight novices require lots of time (and lots of
food!), on the other hand it’s great having more hands for
house
cleaning and outdoor work, and more players for soccer and basketball.
Thanks again to those of you who helped us build the outdoor court a
couple of years back.
Meanwhile Francisco Ramirez
(from our
Mid-America Province), who was
with us here last here, went to Puebla to be assistant director for the
common second year postulancy. There, in addition to the friars on the
staff, they have eleven postulants: five for Mexico, five for our
California mission, and one for Texas. If they all persevere, that
group of eleven will come here next year. Time to add on another
bathroom!
In the larger perspective, we
in the
north are working on a Strategic
Plan for our mission, focusing on our development needs and with the
hope of becoming a custody in the near future. That of course depends
chiefly upon a stability of missionary friars, from the United States,
from Brasil and from any other country where we can find help. Our
general minister John Corriveau visited us in May, and continues his
efforts to recruit friars to help us. John’s visit was a
wonderful
grace
for us, at the same time a unique and blessed opportunity for the young
men in formation to meet and visit with him.
On the pastoral front all’s quiet, and gets more quiet each
year. The
steady migration out of Tres Ojitos and the little towns around, for
the
sake of jobs and education, leaves us with fewer families in the
parishes, fewer children in catechism, and fewer workers and leaders in
general for parish activities. Each year the number of sacraments
decreases, and I haven’t celebrated a wedding of young people
(a few
convalidations, yes) in these five towns for more than two years. The
young men head off to the United States or other places to work after
"secundaria" (equivalent to about the 10th grade), so the young ladies
thinking about marriage have to go elsewhere too, or vie for the few
available young men.
Having eight novices here in
this
scenario provides us some interesting
opportunities in "affective formation."
While the parish work is
limited, our
friary and grounds are still very
popular for retreats, recollection days, confession, spiritual
direction, etc. It’s a great place to walk and pray,
especially this
year it seems to me that the wild flowers are more plentiful and
beautiful than ever, and we’re gathering lots of
"hierbanís" (an
anis
plant that grows wild here makes a tasty and healthy tea) for the
winter. The garden’s good this year too, so we’re
enjoying roasting
ears, which the locals eat with a heavy doze of hot chili powder
sprinkled on top of the butter or mayonnaise. This is apple country,
but
the local apple blossoms all froze in the spring, but we’re
hoping for
donations from lower altitudinal places so we can preserve lots of jam
for the winter months too.
Well, it’s time to
bring this to a close.
Please continue to pray for
me and us in the mission, especially for the young Mexican men who are
helping us implant the Capuchin Order here…and who will
allow us
missionaries to return home in the future. Each month I receive from
the mission office in Denver a list of people enrolled in the Capuchin
Mission Association, and I happily and gratefully remember you in my
prayers and Masses here in Tres Ojitos. God bless all of you, and to
each I send un abrazo y una oración, which is a hug and a
prayer,
Bill
