Fr. Pedro Kühlcke Tag

PARAGUAY, by Susana Stanley • The phone rang.  My sister-in-law told me that my nephew had been assaulted two blocks from his house!  I asked the usual questions:  Is he okay? Was he hurt?  He was not hurt, and then she told me about the assault.  Two boys, one about age 12 and the other 17 stopped him, and at gunpoint, they demanded his cell phone and wallet.  He gave these to them and ran home where he called his mother.  They went to the police station to report theRead More
PARAGUAY, by Johana and Horacio Chávez Tottil • It was a chilly morning in Tupãrenda, but it was sunny. From the beginning of Holy Mass in Most Holy Trinity Church, the warmth of the youths’ was evident with the Girls’ Youth flags during the procession and they were present during the liturgy, because this Holy Mass was a “conquest” of the Girls’ Youth from the Dioceses of San Lorenzo and Caácupé. The women who followed Jesus Fr. Pedro Kühlcke, the Girls’ Youth adviser, celebrated this Mass and in the homily,Read More
Fr. Pedro Kühlcke, Prison Ministry, Paraguay • Sometime ago, Pepito was finally able to tell me his life story:  “I was eleven years old when my parents separated.  My father is an alcoholic; he abused my mother until she could no longer take it.  I decided to go live with him, because I knew that he would not place limits on me.  I began with cigarettes and alcohol, and then the drugs came.  I even did drugs in front of him, but he never told me anything-he was usually tooRead More
PARAGUAY, by María Fischer • “Holy Father, do you remember Orlando?” Fr. Tommy Nin Mitchell, the director for the Schoenstatt Movement in Paraguay asked the Holy Father during the audience with the General Chapter of the Schoenstatt Fathers in September 2015. “Yes, I remember Orlando,” said Pope Francis. Orlando is the young boy – interned at the minor penitentiary in Itaguá – who greeted the Pope in Asunción during his meeting with the youth, which resulted in the Holy Father changing his speech. “After having read the Gospel, Orlando cameRead More
PARAGUAY, Maria Fischer • “The schoenstatt.org article about your visit to the prison for minors brought me to the Prison Ministry,” a young member of the Mother’s branch told me. For some time, she knows where she is every Saturday afternoon: The Visitation of Mary, visiting the youngsters at the Itauguá Children’s Penitentiary, the largest in Paraguay, with almost 220 prisoners aged between 14 and 18. “This visit touched me so much.” “Me too,” I thought, because even though I’m only able to visit these youngsters once a year, havingRead More
PARAGUAY, by Ana María Acha, president of FundaProva (Foundation for the promotion of values and the prevention of violence) • Since my beginning as a legislator in 2003 until having fulfilled the term of office in 2013, and as President of the Human Rights Commission for the Chamber of Senators, I felt I should prioritize a special concern for the country’s prisoners. This because I could never visualize another place where a human being could be more degraded than in the Republic’s prisons. Prisoners should only be deprived of theRead More
PARAGUAY, Fr. Pedro Kühlcke • – Hello, Pepito! Are you in jail again? Too bad! Why? –Yes, Fr. forgive me! I was out for four months. However, I did not find work anywhere, I did not have support from anyone; you know my family chaos. Temptation was stronger, and I failed again. The sorrow: A short time after his release, he is in jail again Almost two years ago when we became aware that the Blessed Mother wanted to send us to such an existential periphery like a jail forRead More
PARAGUAY, Fr. Pedro Kühlcke, Maria Fischer • Christmas in jail: the Itauguá juvenile detention center, a few kilometers from the Schoenstatt Shrine at Tupãrenda. For a little more than a year, ‘mercy’ has a face here, mercy that has to do with being and doing, just as Fr. Juan Pablo Catoggio said during the opening of the Holy Door at the Original Shrine. During preparation for World Youth Day in Kraków during the Year of Mercy, Pope Francis asked youths to select and carry out a physical and spiritual actRead More
By Ani Souberlich, Vicky Ramírez Jou, Sonia Zaracho, Marité and Ramón Marini, José Argüello, Fr. José Pontes, Andreza Ortigoza, Mima Cardona, María Emilia Vidal, Maria Fischer, Fr. Antonio Cosp and 50,000 pilgrims • “How the world’s largest 18 October was experienced in Tupãrenda, Paraguay,” is the title of a Facebook post, while, Fr. Antonio Cosp thanked all the collaborators for their contribution to the “celebration of celebrations in Tuparenda.” The songs along with Bishop Francisco Pistilli and Fr. Pedro Kühlcke, Bishop Joaquín Robledo, Bishop of San Lorenzo (bilingual) and Fr.Read More
PARAGUAY, by María Fischer • We arrived after an adventurous trip in Father Pedro Kühlcke’s car, through paths of red dirt a little lost in the jungle, with holes and gigantic waves of ground that made me enjoy a feeling of a free Dakar Rally, or something like that. But the greater adventure of that day was still to come. The greater adventure is named Ángel (name was changed), who is 17 years old and he is one of Fr. Pedro Kühlcke’s young friends from the Prison Ministry, Visitación deRead More