Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Tony Melendez

As I followed the news of the recent canonizations in Rome of now-Saints John Paul II and John XXIII, I saw Tony Melendez perform and reflect on the time he sang for St. John Paul II. See: http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Man-With-No-Arms-Plays-Guitar-With-Feet-at-Catholic-Service-256794331.html

And that reminded me of a seminarian in the English Course taught by Fr. Augustine Senda, SVD.   And so, just now, I was facebook messaging with Tony about it and he asked me to send the story to him.  And I sent this to him:

I recently returned from a 2-month trip to Indonesia. As a volunteer, my job was to help seminarians and newly-ordained priests and others practice their conversational English -- with a native English speaker -- before being sent worldwide as missionaries. Their order is the Divine Word Missionaries. 

Indonesians LOVE to sing, and do so from birth. Many of them are very musical -- sing, play guitar, keyboard, midi, and sing in 4-part harmony easily. So we shared a lot of songs in English as another way of practicing. One day, one of the seminarians --Argus -- asked me to sing one of your songs with him. It was one I didn't know. So he sang it -- impromtpu. I just wanted  to thank you for that moment, and for blessing that seminarian. Under God's grace and the movement of the Holy Spirit, your music has made it around the world, even to a remote part of a developing country in southeast Asia. Blessings to you and your beautiful family and ministry. Praise God from who all blessings flow.


Joannie the Island Girl/Queen of Sheba
www.songsoflife.co
www.inourmidst.net

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