In the Promise of Hope - Letter From Our Executive Director

Dear Members, Partners, and Friends,

When I used to lead formation retreats, we would often include a mission-themed movie night. Often dealing with topics such as oppression, genocide and martyrdom, the films were hardly the most hopeful viewing—at least on the face of it. And yet, these topics and themes not only resonate with my own experiences in places like Haiti, Guatemala and Ciudad Juarez, but, in fact, these are the very same circumstances in which I have encountered, in concrete and profound ways, the hope-filled presence of our Lord. 

As we continue our Lenten journey towards Easter, I can’t help but reflect upon the critical (if paradoxical) role that encounter with the harsh realities of our world plays both in bearing witness to hope and in cultivating such hope within ourselves. In standing at the foot of the cross, we stand already in the promise of the Resurrection. Pope Francis, in his Message for World Mission Day this year, reminds us that, often, it is “those excluded from materialistic and consumerist society” who “teach us how to live in hope.” He urges us to seek, encounter and respond to these realities in “God’s ‘style’: with closeness, compassion and tenderness, cultivating a personal relationship with our brothers and sisters in their specific situation.” 

It’s what, in  Evangelii Gaudium, the Holy Father describes as “touching the suffering flesh of Christ in others.” Such closeness, drawn from the wellspring of God’s love, is the clearest sign of hope amid our “human crisis” of “a widespread sense of bewilderment, loneliness and indifference…” That’s why living the mission is so vital to our knowing Christ more fully and discerning more deeply the will of the Lord: when we seek and encounter brokenness, we discover God’s reign breaking through the cracks.

In mission and solidarity,


Kevin Foy
Executive Director