Apr 5, 2018
The Missionaries of the Sacred Heart are very sad to announce the passing of Fr Mark McDonald, our former Superior General.
Fr Mark McDonald passed away on April 2, 2018 at the Sacred Heart Villa in Center Valley, Pennsylvania at age 75. Father McDonald was born July 22, 1942 in Watertown, New York, the son of Donald and Anna Murrock McDonald. He was a graduate of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart School and Immaculate Heart Academy.
Fr McDonald attended St. Bonaventure University for two years and began his studies to become a Missionary of the Sacred Heart (MSC) in 1961. He completed his philosophy studies in Quebec, Canada and graduated from Laval University in Quebec City in 1964. He completed his theological studies in Rome, Italy and graduated from the Angelicum Pontifical University in Rome in 1968. He was ordained a priest of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart on June 29, 1968 in Watertown by Bishop Thomas Donnellan.
After ordinaton, Fr McDonald taught at the Sacred Heart Preparatory Seminary and Immaculate Heart Central High School (IHC), both in Watertown. In 1972, he became Vice Principal at IHC. In 1976, he became Director of the MSC Retreat and Renewal Center in Shelby, Ohio. In 1983, he became Formation Director for the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart in Bogota, Colombia and in 1985 became Sectional Superior of the MSCs in Colombia.
In 1991, Fr McDonald was elected Provincial of the MSCs in the United States headquartered in Aurora, Illinois. In 1997, he became Pastor of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart parish in Watertown. In 1999, he became Director of Cor Novum (the MSC retreat and renewal center in Issoudun, France). From 2005 to 2017, he was Superior General of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart worldwide located in Rome, Italy. Fr McDonald became semi-retired in 2018 and was residing at the Sacred Heart Villa in Center Valley, Pennsylvania.
Please keep Fr Mark McDonald in your thoughts and prayers.
Fr Mark McDonald MSC, 1942 – 2018
Source: Watertown Daily Times
Mar 27, 2018
Our dear friends in Loreto School, Rumbek, have again been in touch to keep us updated on the life changing improvements they have been able to make as a result of your generous donations to our South Sudan Appeal.
Sadly, in Rumbek, things have gotten worse – but that has only increased the efficacy and impact of our South Sudan Appeal and the MSC’s support. The following are some very positive updates we received from the Loreto Team in South Sudan:
- Loreto Primary School graduated its first class from Primary 8 – 100% pass rate in the National Primary Certificate Exams – the level needed to achieve this is 50%. No Loreto Students were below 72% and both Loreto Primary School and one of it’s students were in the Top 10 in Western Lakes State.
- Loreto Primary added a primary school this year with about 150 students.
- Increased Enrollment – Loreto Primary and Loreto Secondary have increased their numbers this year with over 1000 primary school students and nearly 300 secondary school girls.
- The Loreto Girls Secondary School Class of 2017 sat their exams in March (2018); 100% of the girls who sat the exam in 2017 (class of 2016) passed.
- The Loreto Graduate Internship program was identified as one of the most impactful short-term projects implements by Out of the Box (OTB) external evaluators. The MSC Graduate house will increase the number of girls that they can offer this opportunity for.
- The Loreto Schools 10th anniversary is fast approaching (April 2018) and they are preparing to celebrate their 10th year since the secondary school opened in South Sudan.
A big thank you to Benjamin, Loreto Programs Manager in Rumbek, for sending us these fantastic pictures perfectly capturing the amazing work being done in the Loreto Schools.
Mar 20, 2018
The Loreto Schools Rumbek have started their largest year yet!
In the Loreto Primary School, which helps support and educate young community members from Maker Kuei, there are over 1000 students enrolled between the morning and afternoon sessions. More importantly, the school has an average female enrollment of 44% girls. This is a 3% increase from last year.
National rates of female enrollment vary from as low as 25% up to approximately 33% depending on the source. The Loreto Schools hope to reach about 50% female participation in the coming years.
The Loreto Girls Secondary School had nearly 350 students attempt to enroll, sadly the school only had placements for about 100 students.
The team at Loreto are very excited to welcome the next generation of the Loreto Rumbek School families!
Mar 13, 2018
Yesterday, Monday 12th March 2018, the first two MSC arrived to commence the Congregation’s new mission in Mozambique.
Fr Angelo and Fr Eduardo from the Sao Paulo Province arrived with their provincial, Fr Edivaldo and the Superior General, Fr Absalon to be greeted and received by the Bishop and pastoral workers of the Diocese of Pemba where we will establish the mission in a very poor part of the country with no church infrastructure or functioning pastoral ministry. This project has been several years in the planning and we congratulate the Sao Paulo Province for its missionary courage in taking on this new mission.
Ametur Ubique Terrarum Cor Iesu Sacratissimum – May the most Sacred Heart of Jesus be loved everywhere.
Jan 29, 2018
Our dear friend, Sr Orla Treacy, and the Loreto Sisters are celebrating 10 years of incredible, yet extremely challenging work in the Loreto Schools, Rumbek.
In February 2006, Sr Orla Treacy stepped off a plane in Sudan ready to set up a girls’ boarding school in a remote region in the south of the country. She had been told the project was already under way and had reassured her parents she would be home in Ireland by the end of the year. However, the 33-year-old nun arrived at the site outside the town of Rumbek only to find an empty field with no buildings.
“We were told not to worry, that everything would be ready by Easter. It took two years for the building to reach the point where we could actually start, and then we discovered we were also supposed to open a primary school and clinic for the local community.”
Sr Treacy also faced the challenge of convincing local families to send their daughters to a secondary school in a country where only a third of girls enrol in primary school. Of these, just 7 per cent finish their primary education and only 2 per cent make it into secondary education. Less than 1 per cent actually graduate. More than half of girls in South Sudan are married before the age of 18, and 17 per cent before they turn 15.
“If you live in a culture where marriage is more popular than school, it’s very hard to change that mentality. The girl is married for a dowry of cows so she’s considered a wealth to the family. She’s also the property of the extended family, not just the mother and father.”
Sr Orla Treacy
Sign an agreement
The Loreto sisters decided fathers would sign an agreement with the school promising to allow their daughters to complete their education. However, extended family members such as uncles would often turn up at the gates demanding their teenage niece be released for marriage. “We have been threatened at gunpoint, we have been insulted, all number of problems because she is a woman and should be sacrificed for the sake of the greater good. Technically it’s a boarding school but I call it a women’s refuge because you’re constantly trying to protect these girls from forced marriage.”
When Sr Treacy first decided to become a nun, she never imagined she would end up the principal of a school in a war-torn state in east Africa. In fact, when she first told friends and siblings about her decision to enter the church, they told her she was crazy.
“I thought I was crazy too. I realised it wasn’t fashionable or popular to become a nun at that time. I talked to one of my brothers and he told me to travel the world and then see how I felt.”
Sr Treacy put the decision on hold and studied to become a religion teacher at the Mater Dei Institute. During the summer after her final year in college, she worked in Calcutta. “That was a real changing point for me. There was a lot of hunger and poverty in Calcutta in the early ’90s and that really struck me. I had accepted a job to teach religion with the Presentation Brothers in Cork City and worked there for two years but by the age of 23 I realised that life wasn’t for me and I joined the Loreto sisters.”
Loreto School Rumbek – Class of 2017
New mission
It was only when Sr Treacy returned to Calcutta eight years later that she began to consider working overseas. She discovered the Irish Loreto sisters were setting up a new mission in Sudan following the country’s 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement. It was believed the agreement would bring peace and stability following decades of conflict. “There was a sense that great things were happening in south Sudan. And so three of us set out there in February 2008.”
Ten years later Sr Treacy is still running the Rumbek secondary boarding school, the primary school and the local clinic. The past decade has not been easy.
In 2011 South Sudan gained independence from Sudan. However, in 2013 civil war broke out in the new country, with some 200,000 people forced to flee their homes and more than two million displaced.
Hunger continues to be a huge problem in this country of 12 million people.
“When we started the primary school we used to not feed the kids, but we’ve found over the past two years there’s a great hunger, so now we feed everybody. We also need to provide healthcare because many of them can’t afford medicine or access to good treatment.”
As it celebrates its 10th anniversary, the school is struggling more than ever financially. However, Sr Treacy remains hopeful for the school’s future and the education of girls in the Rumbek area. “I work with people who live very much on the margins: life and death, hunger and despair. Every day they live on the edge. And yet in that you can still glimpse love and hope every day.”
After more than two decades as a nun, Sr Treacy is also confident she made the right decision by joining the Loreto sisters. “In life you’re always wondering what if or what might have been. Being a nun is not always perfect and there are moments when I wonder what the hell did I do? But I don’t think any relationship is perfect and I have certainly found a peacefulness in myself. I don’t worry about the future too much and I’m very happy in the role I’ve chosen.”
The MSC are very proud supporters of the amazing work carried out daily by Sr Orla and the Loreto Sisters in South Sudan. If you would like to offer financial support to the Loreto Schools Rumbek you can do so by clicking the box below.
PLEASE HELP US TO SAVE LIVES IN SOUTH SUDAN
