SVD Mission Articles: St. Paul Seminary Celebrates 70 Years!

St. Paul Seminary Celebrates 70th Anniversary
By Fr. Antonio Pernia, SVD (Superior General of the Society)

Fr. Antonio Pernia, SVD, is the current Superior General of the Society of the Divine Word. He was born in 1949 in the Philippines, and 20 years later professed his first vows as a Divine Word Missionary. He was ordained in 1975 and continued his missionary work in the Philippines. He served as vice rector then rector of the Diocesan Major Seminary in Davao, and in 1985 Fr. Pernia began his doctoral studies in Rome. After his studies, he served one year at Divine Word Seminary in Tagaytay before being elected Vice Provincial in one of the Philippine Provinces. He was elected Vise Superior General in 1994 and became the first Asian Superior General of a major mens’ congregation in 2000. He was re-elected and began his second term leading the 6000+ Society in July 2006.

(Editor’s note: Fr. Pernia writes monthly in a newsletter, Arnoldus Nota, to all SVDs around the world. In edited format, this was his article September 2007. He highlights the 70th Anniversary of St. Paul’s Seminary in Indonesia and commends the work of the missionaries serving in formation ministry).

This year St. Paul Major Seminary in Ledalero, Indonesia, celebrates the 70th anniversary of its foundation. As we all know, “Ledalero” is the biggest formation house in the whole Society at the present time. This year some 750 students attend classes at the seminary – 275 SVD scholastics, 225 diocesan seminarians, 100 students from other religious congregations, both men and women, and 150 lay students. The staff of professors and formators number around 50 (between SVD’s, diocesan priests and other religious). Over 70 years of its existence, about 1,300 have been ordained priests – of which, 14 have been named bishops and 775 are SVDs. Of the SVD graduates of Ledalero, some 350 have been sent abroad as missionaries in other parts of the world. That is 45% of its graduates. To date, around 250 continue as missionaries outside Indonesia.

Clearly, there is reason to celebrate. Although the exact date of its foundation was May 5, 1937, it was decided to hold the official 70th anniversary celebration on August 15, 2007, on the occasion of the profession of perpetual vows of this year’s graduating class.

On the feast of the Assumption of Mary on August 15, during the solemn Eucharistic celebration marking the 70th anniversary of Ledalero, 17 young confreres professed perpetual vows in the Society of the Divine Word. Two bishops and some 120 priests concelebrated and about a thousand persons attended the mass. The mass was held at the aula magna rather than in the newly rebuilt chapel due to the number of guests who came. The ceremony of the profession of vows was already impressive in itself. But even more impressive was when the IDE Provincial Superior called each one of the 17 confreres and presented him to the congregation along with his first mission assignment. Congo, Angola, Botswana, Madagascar, Argentina, Colombia, Bolivia, PNG, Japan, etc. Only four of the 17 confreres received first assignments to Indonesia. It was as if the whole world suddenly became present in that hall in Ledalero. Thus, the whole ceremony that morning caught in a nutshell the goal and purpose of Ledalero – the formation and training of religious missionaries meant to serve God’s people in Indonesia and beyond. Indeed, it was a fitting celebration of Ledalero’s 70th anniversary.

In conjunction with the celebration, the philosophy and theology faculty of the major seminary organized a one-day seminar on August 13 with the theme “SVD Formation for Prophetic Dialogue.” There were three speakers – aside from myself on prophetic dialogue and the fundamental conversions it requires of SVD Missionaries, Dr. S. Belen, a layman and former SVD seminarian, spoke on a model of collaboration with the laity, and Fr. Yoseph Suban Hayon, SVD, one of the professors and formators of Ledalero, on the possibilities and challenges of formation for prophetic dialogue in Ledalero. The seminar was attended by the whole academic community of Ledalero and some invited guests from the town of Maumere, mostly religious and some government officials. The seminar served to underline the fact that, over the years, St. Paul Major Seminary has developed from being a simple institution for the training of priests and religious to a government-recognized Faculty which offers a graduate degree program in the Philosophy of Religions.

It was not difficult to sense that one was breathing a different air in Ledalero this time around. There is now a much greater openness to internationality, a much greater awareness of the universal mission of the Church, a much greater sense of the world outside of Indonesia. The presence of the formators from the ASPAC zone, the seminar on SVD formation for prophetic dialogue, the announcement of the first assignments of the 17 young confreres all underlined this new atmosphere in Ledalero. So did the presence of some 20 Indonesian confreres on home leave from their mission assignments in other parts of the world – from Congo, Togo, Germany, Italy, Poland, Chile, Argentina, Mexico, PNG, Philippines, Japan. In fact, the number of those coming from Spanish-speaking provinces of the Society was big enough to form a small choir which sang Spanish songs during the program, after the mass and at the banquet.

I take this opportunity to congratulate our confreres in Ledalero, as well as the whole Ende Province and, indeed, the entire Society in Indonesia. In a certain sense, St. Paul Major Seminary in Ledalero is the heart of the SVD in Indonesia. I wish to thank all the confreres, as well as the many other people, who form part of the history of this institution – the pioneers who started this seminary with vision and courage, and the many generations of confreres and other collaborators who kept this heart beating for God and for his people.

“A place where the sun leans” – this is the rough translation of the word “leda-lero” in the local Sikka language of Maumere. The image is of the sun leaning as if on a wall for support. And the sense is that the sun leans for support so that it can let its light shine out to the world. Over the past 70 years, St. Paul Major Seminary in Ledalero has proven itself to be a “place where the sun leans”. With our confreres in Ledalero, the whole Society prays that this institution may continue to be an instrument which allows the light of the Divine Word to shine on people in Indonesia and abroad. DIRGAHAYU, Ledalero.

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