Impoverished Indonesian island described as ‘promised land for vocations’
February 14, 2024
» Continue to this story on L'Osservatore Romano (Italian)
CWN Editor's Note: The Indonesian island of Flores, an island that is slightly larger than Connecticut, is the “promised land of vocations,” an 80-year-old Italian missionary priest told the Vatican newspaper.
“Here there are four dioceses, five minor seminaries with a total of 500 young candidates—not to mention the interdiocesan seminary, famous for its school of philosophy and theology, where 400 study,” said Father Luigi Galvani.
In addition, “there are around 200 religious institutes, 57 congregations in the Diocese of Maumere alone,” he continued. In Maumere, the Society of the Divine Word, he said, has the largest seminary in the world, described as the “little Vatican,” where 1,300 students from different religious institutes study.
L’Osservatore Romano reported that Flores is the “poorest place in the nation” and that 70% of the island’s 1.5 million residents are Catholic, while Indonesia as a whole is 85% Muslim. The majority of Catholics, said Father Galvani, are “farmers and fishermen” who are “sensitive to the acceptance of the Gospel and religious commitment to such an extent that vocational promotion is very easy”—leading to hundreds of ordinations on the island every year.
Citing a recent request by Muslim bank employees to bless their bank, Father Galvani also spoke of the interfaith harmony on the island.
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