I’m particularly moved at the sight of the fathers who have come here with their wives to look after their children during the Program. So there are the daddies walking with their little babies along the corridors, asking their wives out for breast-feeding sessions and – during the Mass – standing next to their spouses who may then hold the babies to their hearts.

As there is no parenthood without a couple, the same way with the service of a doctor or a practitioner: they all need  help from their wife or husband who work “backstage,” but in fact they make that service possible at all!

So today I’m thinking with special gratitude about all the wives, husbands and children who are staying and home and missing their beloved ones that came here to take part in EP. They know that this time of separation will bear fruit not only to the others, but also for their own families. Because “…whatever you did to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you have done it to Me…”

May God bless you,

Fr Jay

Today we had a visit from Bishop Stefanek who came to celebrate the Mass especially for the Program participants.

In his homily he emphasized the idea behind our Faculty for Studies on the Family to serve human being through all fields of science, including medicine. As Jesus in the Gospel restored health to a profoundly deaf man, NaProTechnology is striving after restoring beauty and truth of man who became mute and deaf in the area of fertility. We are not the masters of life, but its servants. NaProTechnology restores God’s likeness to each person and makes it possible for God to speak through them with the gift of a new life.

It’s such a joy to look at the participants, who came from so many places, left their everyday activities and many tasks, just to give their attention to the beauty of the gift of life. And who have overcome so many difficulties to be able to learn to serve the married couples better.

Always with heartfelt prayer,

Fr Jay

So Day 1 is behind. It turned out that the Program really is in English. All announcements in English, slides in Elnglish, materials in English… Even Poles, as lecturers, speak English only. What a relief that the Mass was in Polish! With the homily both in Polish – and in English.

So the students might be thinking: “Why on Earth have I come here? This is more than I can handle! I should have learnt more! No chance for me to pass the exam! Those Americans  speak terribly, you just can’t understand them!…” And you could go on like that for an hour or so.  😉

Well. Apart from the sympathy there is the awareness that most of us who have already taken part in the program – survived!

Which does not change the fact that the first day is difficult. Tomorrow it will be probably even more difficult. But in a while the medical terms will become more familiar, the accent won’t be so disturbing and the words will flow into sentences.

And we should remember about the students in our prayers. So that they don’t give up. And if your Guardian Angel speaks good American, you can send Him to help them.

Good luck, People!

Fr Jay

Guests from various cities and states started arriving at Łomianki yesterday at 6 p.m. They carried on their conversations in their native languages, but from the next day on they’d need English. The Poles ask a student from Slovakia to switch to Polish and Slovakian. They’ll understand one another somehow. But they will grow confident in speaking English for sure.

Croatia has sent a team of 7 people. They stick together – for the time being. In a week’s time, when the Education Program ends, they’ll be all one big family. You cannot love life and stay alien to one another. It’s just impossible.

I meet the acquainted doctors from the Catholic Association of Gynecologists and Obstetricians. It was on one of their meetings when we’d heard  about something called NaProTechnologyfor the first time. It feels as if it was yesterday, and so much has happened ever since.

Today we have the opening ceremony. And no more excuses – from now on all communication in English only! To start from how to get to the Chapel or where to eat lunch and to finish with where to wash your hands.

During the first hour of the Program the students were provided with all the necessary information. The second hour is already a lecture given by Dr Hilgers.

The Education Program has started! And I’m asking you, Dear Readers, for support in your prayers. The Program participants need it VERY MUCH.

Your reporter,

Fr Jay

I would like to thank you all for the gift of your friendship. It was you who made that month so extraordinary. Your hospitality, generosity, kindness and warm hearts enabled me to experience this much. I’d done many things for the first time in my life. And even though those experiences they gave me so much joy, what makes them even more beautiful is the consciousness that I owed it all to real people.

I am not going to list your names. They are written in my heart. Although here you’ll stay anonymous, I believe our Lord will reward you in Heaven. “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for Me”.

I’m going back Home. I’m taking with me all your Homes, which were so hospitable and invited me to become part of them. When you are invited to a place, you bring in peace with you, but you also take with you the important matters of that place. My visits to so many Homes during this month showed and taught me a lot, and they touched my heart. I am taking all you’ve taught me to share with the others. Much of your wisdom has already appeared here, in “The Harbour”. Thank you – and let me thank you in the name of our Readers.

I also thak you, Dear Friends of “The Harbour”, for inviting us to your Homes on your computer screens. We would like to bring you always peace. Sometimes – to inspire, provoke, motivate you. But we are also taking you and the matters important to you in our prayer before the Holy Family.

With heartfelt prayer, full of gratitude,

Fr. Jay

I mentioned earlier that some of you won’t be able to go on vacation at all, or managed to spend just one week at the seaside, 5 days of wich were rainy. What then? I think that really much depends on our imagination. I know families who visited all the museums in town during vacation, enjoying those lessons in history and culture a lot.

I know one Dad who set off on a expedition with his little sonny: they made supper on the campfire and slept in the tent. In their own garden. A child doesn’t need to cover hundreds of kilometers to have the sense of a wonderful adventure.

I know a family in which the oldest sister prepares a quiz each week for her younger siblings. She comes up on her own with the rules and questions for the game, and her brothers and sisters simply can’t wait! And you? What are your ideas for vacation full of adventure?

I am going to an art museum. There’s a great exhibition of Dutch painting.

With warmest regards,

xj

– we can see and hear during the Olympic Games. It’s wonderful, but…

…Makes me wonder if that new olympic “tradition” does not introduce – through the back door – the civilization of the death of the fathers? I love my Mum very much, but I also love my late Dad. I would like them both to be proud of me. Not only my Mum. Each child needs both, Mum and Dad. Either of them has their task to do. This new fashion of eliminating fathers can’t result in anything good.

What can we do, then? We can teach children respect for both parents. Mums – can teach respect for Fathers, and Fathers – how to respect Mums. One Mum told me the other day that her several-year-old son answered to her: you do the tidying up yourself, because you have nothing else to do. I don’t think he came up with this idea on his own.

My dear Men. I’m asking you to do something to make your Wives feel, see and hear today  your respect for them.

I am asking you, Dear Wives, do the same for your Husbands.

With no occasion. Just to refresh your memory. May your Marital/Family Olympic Games have their own disciplines and competitions. And I wish you only gold medals.

Fr Jay

– the two last dives early this morning. The first one included visiting our Lord Jesus, whose statue is located next to one of the most beautiful Key Largo coral reefs. You can see the sculpture here.

As my course mates were not with me this time, I had to find myself a buddy to dive with. Another diver had the same problem, so we made a good match. We started from seeing the statue, and then went on to admire the reef life.

It was first time ever I’d seen a turtle under the water. It moved with an awesome elegance and speed, which was surprising when you bear in mind its proverbial pace. We accompanied the turtle for a while, to be left behind quite soon. Then the meeting with a shark – amazing as usual. It let us swim quite close, unlike a barracude which showed clearly we had invaded her comfort zone. We were swimming for some time surrounded by a shoal od fish, feeling we were tolerated, but still alien to their world.

It was a beautiful farewell.

But it was also interesting to experience how we – the participants of that excursion – changed. When we got on the boat, we greeted one another, as the Americans do. It was quite different after we finished diving. We engaged into an emotional exchange of impressions, hearing also the voices of a real “divers’ envy” – that we’d seen a turtle and a shark, and they had not. Some divers approached us to say “thank you” for showing them the way to the statue, which they could not find themselves. Well, you are a priest also under the water.

Passion brings people together, common experiences are vital for your unity. So you need a common ground. Now it’s time of vacation. It’s good to do something together: only a husband and a wife. For yourselves. To feel one.

Keeping you in my memory and prayer,

Fr Jay

Seems to be the same as any other one, but…

There is something mysterious in going under water when the only source of light is your torch. There are different procedures. We learned them first in theory to put them into practice afterwards. And I’d been waiting for that moment so much.

We were to dive twice in the same place. For the first time – to practice navigation. The second one – just for the pleasure of getting to know the underwater world. The sun accomapanied us to our place of destination. We dived in the ocean in the same time.

We saw one another when we were going down, but after a few moments our torches became indispensable.

Those who have never tried diving will find it difficult to imagine the impressions. Swimming in the complete darkness (to see phosphorescent organisms and to prove how courageous we are), fish coming out of the blue, a giant lobster moving at a surprising speed, the joy of seeing the light of our boat above, the joy of completing the course and having the chance of being together with people who share the same passion…

All those seem to be simple joys, but they give perspective to other things we normally do. It’s about discovering the world which exists without our knowledge and experiencing the beauty that not everybody can see. Just as the family life, which has its depth, but to see it you need to go deep. You need to take the equipment which seems so heavy on the water surface, but it lets you see the things you could not see without it at the depth. “Launch out into deep water” – is an invitation for every family. On the surface there are the waves, the endless space of the ocean, but when you go deep, you’ll see the reality teeming with life.

And this is what I would like to wish you all. Even if you are not divers, open your eyes to the riches at the depth of each of you.

With prayer from the depth

Fr Jay