The Friars and people of Sri Lanka are grateful to the Franciscan Mission Association for making the new Formation House in Kandy possible. Completed in 2016, the new Formation House in Kandy is a Pontifical Faculty, serving as the Post-Novitiate site for the friars’ Philosophy and Theology studies. Through the generous support of friends and benefactors through an online campaign, the Franciscan Mission Association also paid to ship over 5,000 theology, philosophy, spirituality, and history books donated by the Friars of the Our Lady of the Angels Province in the United States. In April 2016, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., Minister Provincial of the Our Lady of the Angels Province, traveled to Sri Lanka to attend the blessing of the new Formation House in Kandy.
The friar-students hand made a welcome arch out of coconut palm fronds. The new Formation House was formerly a hotel with four stories which will ensure that the Friars will get ample daily exercise.
The Minister Provincial of St. Maximilian Kolbe Province in India, the Very Reverend Fr. Leo Payappilly, OFM Conv. (right), hosted our Minister Provincial, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv. (left), throughout his visit. The Indian Province established its first mission in Sri Lanka seven years ago.
The elaborate “Inauguration” ceremony included lighting candles on a candelabra made by the friars out of the trunk, fronds, and flowers of the coconut tree. As the ceremony progressed, the big moment came for the cutting of the red ribbon – an honor accorded to our Minister Provincial. Bishop Fernando blessed each room of the new Friary, beginning with the Chapel.
The Minor Seminarians from the Mission’s formation house in Katana (Colombo) made the four-hour journey to Kandy to participate in the festivities (pictured in the Chapel). On the second day of the celebrations, Sunday the 24th, Fr. James celebrated the first Mass in the newly inaugurated and blessed Chapel, and afterwards processed outside to bless the Grotto of Our Lady, which the seminarians themselves had constructed. Fr. James left a donation for the friars to get a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, which will eventually the grace the new Grotto.
In a noon time ceremony outside of the Shrine of St. Anthony, our friars who serve on the Province Definitory, and FMA/Companions of St. Anthony staff members, joined our Minister Provincial, the Very Reverend Fr. James McCurry, OFM Conv., as he blessed the donated books prior to their departure to the year-old Franciscan Friars Conventual Formation House, named for the Sri Lanka’s first saint, the Indian missionary priest St. Joseph Vaz, who died in Kandy in 1711 and was canonized by Pope Francis during his 2015 papal visit to Sri Lanka.
On the evening of July 22, 2017 the delivery of donated theology books finally arrived in Kandy, Sri Lanka! the truck was unloaded with the help of 11 young friars in formation.