St. Joseph Freinademetz: Ideal Missionary PDF

1 St. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ THE IDEAL MISSIONARY Objectives: 2  Elaboratemore of St. Joseph Freinademetz's mission as he went to China.  Discuss the challenges and lessons he taught as he interacted with the Chinese people  Fr. Joseph Freinad...

1 St. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ THE IDEAL MISSIONARY Objectives: 2  Elaboratemore of St. Joseph Freinademetz's mission as he went to China.  Discuss the challenges and lessons he taught as he interacted with the Chinese people  Fr. Joseph Freinademetz was a pioneer missionary to China  3 Short Activity: 1. What is the most noble thing that you have done for the sake of your belief? ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 4 IDEAL MISSIONARY ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 5 IDEAL MISSIONARY  ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 6 IDEAL MISSIONARY St. Joseph Freinademetz became the kind of missionary Father Janssen had in mind in establishing the religious congregation.  ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 7 IDEAL MISSIONARY Although Father Janssen and Father Freinademetz spent only a short time together in the first mission house in Steyl, both were beatified and then canonized together. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 8 IDEAL MISSIONARY - Fu Shenfu / Fu=Freinademetz & Shenfu = Priest -was born on April 15, 1852 – January 28, 1908 - Oies, Dolomite Alps of Northern Italy - The region, known as South Tyrol – Austro- Hungarian Empire. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 9 IDEAL MISSIONARY - He was baptised on the day he was born. - Inherited from his family a simple but tenacious faith. - July 25, 1875 – ordained as a priest. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 10 IDEAL MISSIONARY  After he finished the fourth grade, his father apprenticed him to an enterprising tailor, Mr. Thaler.  Without money, God through this good man got the young Joseph started on his way to the priesthood, his vocation. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 11 IDEAL MISSIONARY Joseph did household chores for a lady in order to have a place to sleep. He became a working student in the school where he could continue his studies. To survive, he begged for his food. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 12 IDEAL MISSIONARY While Joseph was studying theology in the diocesan seminary of Bressanone (Brixen), he began to think seriously of the foreign missions as a way of life. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 13 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Honor Student  And he received scholarships for his high grades and for his singing in the cathedral choir for eight years of studies and plus his theological courses.  The bishop ordained him a priest on July 25, 1875. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 14 IDEAL MISSIONARY  He was assigned to the community of Saint Martin very near his own home, where he soon won the hearts of the people.  However, the call to missionary service did not go away.  CHINA - crying out for the bread i.e. Eucharist ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 15 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Justtwo years after ordination he contacted Fr. Arnold Janssen, the founder of a mission house which quickly developed into the Society of the Divine Word.  ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 16 IDEAL MISSIONARY  With his bishop's permission, Joseph entered the mission house in Steyl, Netherlands, in August 1878.  On March 2, 1879, he received his mission cross and departed for China with Fr. John Baptist Anzer, another Divine Word Missionary.  ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 17 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Five weeks later they arrived in Hong Kong,  where they remained for two years, preparing themselves for the next step.  In 1881 they travelled to their new mission in South Shantung, a province with 12 million inhabitants and only 158 Christians. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 18 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Those were hard years, marked by long, arduous journeys, assaults by bandits, and the difficult work of forming the first Christian communities.  As soon as a community was just barely developed an instruction from the Bishop would arrive, telling him to leave everything and start anew.  19 STRUGGLE  Beaten and robbed  Lesser and higher mandarin  He fell on his horse  He though he had lost his divine office book  20 STRUGGLE  The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Boxer Uprising, the Boxer Insurrection, or the Yihetuan Movement  anti-foreign, anti-colonial, and anti-Christian uprising in China between 1899 and 1901 ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 21 IDEAL MISSIONARY Later onwards, the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) involved a systematic effort to destroy religion and New Confucianism. The radical policy relaxed considerably in the late 1970s. Since 1978, the Constitution of the People's Republic of China guarantees "freedom of religion". ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 22 IDEAL MISSIONARY Article 36 Citizens of the People's Republic of China shall enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, social organization or individual shall coerce citizens to believe in or not to believe in any religion, nor shall they discriminate against citizens who believe in or do not believe in any religion. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 23 IDEAL MISSIONARY -Soon Joseph came to appreciate the importance of a committed laity, especially catechists, for first evangelisation. -formation and prepared a catechetical manual in Chinese. At the same he put great effort into the preparation: -spiritual formation and -ongoing education of Chinese priests and other missionaries. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 24 IDEAL MISSIONARY His whole life was marked by an effort to become a Chinese among the Chinese, so much so that he wrote to his family: “I love China and the Chinese. I want to die among them and be laid to rest among them.” ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 25 IDEAL MISSIONARY  In1898, Freinademetz was sick with laryngitis and had the beginnings of tuberculosis as a result of his heavy workload and many other hardships. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 26 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Soat the insistence of the bishop and the other priests he was sent for a rest to Japan, with the hope that he could regain his health. He returned to China somewhat recuperated, but not fully cured. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 27 IDEAL MISSIONARY  When the bishop had to travel outside of China in 1907, Freinademetz took on the added burden of the administration of the diocese. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 28 IDEAL MISSIONARY  During this time there was a severe outbreak of typhus.  Joseph, like a good shepherd, offered untiring assistance and visited many communities until he himself became infected. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 29 IDEAL MISSIONARY  He returned to Taikia, the seat of the diocese, where he died on January 28, 1908.  He was buried at the twelfth station on the Way of the Cross, and his grave soon became a pilgrimage site for Christians. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 30 IDEAL MISSIONARY  Freinademetz learned how to discover the greatness and beauty of Chinese culture and to love deeply the people to whom he had been sent. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 31 IDEAL MISSIONARY  He dedicated his life to proclaiming the gospel message of God's love for all peoples, and to embodying this love in the formation of Chinese Christian communities. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 32 IDEAL MISSIONARY  He animated these communities to open themselves in solidarity with the surrounding inhabitants.  And he encouraged many of the Chinese Christians to be missionaries to their own people as catechists, religious, nuns and priests. ST. JOSEPH FREINADEMETZ| 33 IDEAL MISSIONARY His life was an expression of his motto: “The language that all people understand is that of love.”  34 THANK YOU! THE END OR BEGINNING.  35 Concluding Activity: 1. What one word will give to illustrate St. Joseph Freinademetz? Explain briefly.  36 References:  https://www.divineword.org/get-involved/part ners/st-joseph-freinademetz/  https://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/ saints/ns_lit_doc_20031005_freinademetz_en. html