Canada National Saint Kateri Shrine

Pastor's Corner
Fr. Michel Meunier was born in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu on May 24, 1944. He studied at the Séminaire de St-Jean. In 1965, he joined the Missionaries of Africa, and was ordained a priest in 1970.
A few months later, he left for Malawi, in Central Africa.  He first studied the language and customs of an important ethnic group of the country, the Chewas, and he did parish work for seven years. Then he worked as chaplain of schools and youth movements at the diocesan and national levels.
Fr. Michel Meunier, M. Afr.
He was then recalled to Canada for a mission awareness programme in Ottawa and the surrounding area, from 1984 to 1987. He then left for Tanzania where he studied Swahili, the main language of East Africa, for three months. From 1987 to 1994, he worked in Kenya in a large parish in the city of Nairobi. In 1996, after a sabbatical year, he started working in Toronto with African immigrants and refugees. In the meantime, he spent a year in Angola, West Central Africa.
In 2008, he went to South Africa where he worked as  vocation director until 2017. From 2017 to 2018, he spent a year in Zambia as Provincial Secretary of the Southern Province of Africa.
            Since June 2018, in active retirement, he resides in Montreal, at the Provincial House of the Missionaries of Africa (White Fathers).

Sunday, October 9 2022

Mission Month
Every year, October is Mission Month. It reminds us of God’s Mission on earth. Indeed, more than 2000 years ago, God Trinity decided to send Jesus in our world to teach us how to behave as God’s children. Jesus is the first Missionary! He was sent by the Father and assisted by the Holy Spirit. And, as we are Christians (other Christs), we are called to be his missionaries wherever we are: in our families, in our place of work, at school, during our leisure times, etc. We are thus reminded that we are all missionaries, and not only this month, but always. Every year, in October, World Mission Sunday is a day set aside in the Catholic Church throughout the world to publicly renew our commitment to the missionary movement, coordinated by the Pontifical Mission Societies, also known as Mission.  This year, World Mission Day will be celebrated on Sunday 23 October, on the theme "You shall be my witnesses" (Acts 1:8). On that same day, we shall celebrate the 10th anniversary of the canonisation of Saint Kateri Tekahkwitha (21 October 2012). It is very proper: wasn’t she a great missionary? Indeed, she was! May she inspire us to be like her: good and faithful missionaries!