My Dear Brothers, Co-workers and Members of the Hospitaller Family of St John of God

On 17 November, the third Saturday in the month, we shall celebrate the Solemnity of the Patronage of the Blessed Virgin Mary over the Hospitaller Order, as the Patron of our Hospitaller Family of St John of God. I wish you a very happy day, urging you all to celebrate it with joy and love for our Mother.

Devotion to Our Lady is a fundamental part of the spirituality of our Order, and has always been present throughout its history. It is a legacy bequeathed to us by our Founder which we are called to cultivate every day, praying for her protection and ask her to place under her mantle the lives of every member of our Family and all the guests in our centres, and their loved ones.

Our Lady ever-virgin, as he loved to call her, always occupied a central part in St John of God’s life and in his writings. After leaving the Royal Hospital in Granada and after his encounter with Master Avila, he decided to go on a pilgrimage to the monastery at Guadalupe. His first biographer, Castro, wrote that: “John of God set out for the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, to give thanks to her for her past help and favours and to pray for her assistance in the new life he was contemplating. For he always said that he was conscious at all times of her presence and her help in all he did, and whenever he was in need”. (Castro X)

In Granada, there still exists the ‘Sagrario’ Church, although it is no longer the one with which St John of God would have been familiar. We know from an eye-witness account at the time that our holy Founder was in this Church after listening to the sermon preached by Master Avila that caused his conversion by the grace of God. Later biographers elaborated on the mystical legend that Our Lady, accompanied by St John the Evangelist, appeared to St John of God and placed a crown of thorns on his head, thereby linking our Saint’s form of self-giving and suffering to Our Lord’s Passion. And today, in one of the side-chapels in the Church there is a Calvary and nearby, a commemorative stone plaque calling to mind the prayers and divine favours granted thanks to the Blessed John. (Cf. Benavides, F, Granada, la ciudad que cautivó a Juan de Dios. Guía del viajero hospitalario. Granada 2009. Pág 45-47).

But whatever actually took place there, St John of God was certainly a frequently visitor to the Sagrario Church, to spend time with our Lord and his Mother, on his wanderings around the streets of Granada, to thank them for their help to sustain his spiritual life and his work, praying as he had done in Guadalupe for their protection and for continuing to provide help to relieve the sufferings of the poor, the sick and those in need, whose numbers were growing every day. There were other events in his life and in his writings that bear witness to his unfailing devotion to the Queen of Hospitality. We know that the same love and protection he himself experienced has been constantly present in the life of the Order throughout its long history.

Today, I wish to urge all the members of our Hospitaller Family of St John of God on this year’s  Feast of Our Lady’s Patronage, to implore her protection, particularly in relation to two very sensitive situations in the life of our Order. The first is the problem of Batibo in Cameroon, where our little Hospital, our Community and all the members of our Hospitaller Family are passing through extremely difficult times, due to the political state of confrontation - in essence, a pre-civil war situation in that part of Cameroon. People are being displaced, terrified and being killed, and our Centre is virtually the only one left in the zone to care for people’s basic needs. The second is Venezuela. We all know difficult social and political situation in that country, where people are increasingly lacking all their basic needs, while facing greater poverty as well as high rates of child malnutrition. The Brothers and the whole Family of St John of God in Venezuela are continuing to provide services, seeking to come to terms with the newly-arisen needs. While we thank our Brothers and Co-workers in both these geographical areas, Batibo and Venezuela, for their faith and witness, we are also appealing for the support of the whole Family, urging you to pray for the protection of our Mother, invoking her with the same devotion as our Founder, to grant her maternal and never-failing help to our Brothers in both these countries and for all the people there, especially the sick and those in greatest need.

As you know, in two months’ time we shall be celebrating the Order’s 69th General Chapter under the title Shaping the future of Hospitality. This will be an enormously important event for the whole of our Institution which, listening to the Holy Spirit, will be endeavouring to shed light on the paths that lie ahead of us in the future to ensure that we remain faithful to the charism and mission of Hospitality. I ask you all, especially on this Feast of the Patronage, to invoke Our Lady of the Patronage, seeking her blessing, and asking her to accompany and guide us as we prepare for and celebrate the General Chapter. I ask all the members of our Family to begin intensifying your prayers for the successful outcome of our Chapter, also using the prayers prepared for the event by the Pre-Chapter Commission.

Speaking personally, and on behalf of everyone at the General Curia, I wish you all a very happy celebration of the Solemnity of Our Lady of the Patronage and pray that she will bless our beloved Order and all of us, as members of our Hospitaller Family of St John of God.

With my fraternal best wishes.

Brother Jesús Etayo

Superior General