Church history will record Indian Redemptorist Father Desmond de Souza as an intensely committed social apostle in Asia. I first heard of him from another committed Redemptorist – the late Sri Lankan Father Srilal Ameratunga, whose 1990 death still remains shrouded in mystery.
Martyrdom, “whether it be in life or death” is the lot of every social apostle, Father Srilal told me, almost prophetically, when I visited him in Bangalore in the mid 1970s. He was yet a Redemptorist seminarian, when lauding the early apostolates of his outgoing Goan confrere.
I went visiting the Sri Lankan seminarian just after the 1971 Rome Synod on Justice. The infectious spirit of the synod had so enthused the seminarians that they too were engaged in social outreach around the precincts of their seminary. And joyfully he recounted how Father Desmond had joined the struggle of 80,000 fishers against exploitative trawler fleets on the Goan shores.
In the wake of his congregation’s Justice and Peace consultation, in the early 1980s, Father Desmond had involved in religious issues impacted by tourism. From the problems of backpackers visiting Goan beaches, the problems caused by them as well as the evils coming in the train of five-star tourism preoccupied the young Redemptorist.
The regional spillover of these social ills saw Father Desmond join social apostles in search of outreach to victims of tourism in other Asian countries as well.
Such concerns brought him into contact with Hong Kong-based Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC), which had begun to play a vibrant role in Church life and activities Asiawide. This put him in contact with the FABC Office of Human Development and its dynamic executive secretary Father Bonnie Mendes, a Pakistani.
Father Bonnie, who still continues to be a charismatic headhunter for apostolates, was quick to gauge the potential of Father Desmond and groomed the Indian Redemptorist as his successor.
In the 1980s, the dynamic duo’s social ministry moved a step further inspired by prophetic guidance of courageous Church leaders such as Korean Cardinal Stephen Sou-hwan, Japanese future-cardinal Fumio Hamao, and Filipino Bishop Julio Labayan.
They joined forces with the Christian Conference of Asia to birth the Ecumenical Coalition for Third World Tourism (ECTWT).
The Asian ecumenical initiative later expanded with the collaboration of African and Latin American social apostolates.
A theologian in his own right, Father Desmond was possessed of the faith to dare theologize on his feet. He boldly shared his thoughts and engaged in effective ecumenical praxis undeterred by desk-bound theologians stuttering in the hoary grip of crumbling textbooks and fading purple dreams. His publication named Contours played a timely role in OHD’s tourism-related apostolates.
While extending the hand of friendship to apostles on the fringe such as Father Cornelius Breed, he collaborated with CCA leaders such as Ron O’Grady and Peter Holden. Way before issues of child abuse became the hobbyhorse of parlor apostles, Father Desmond was a pioneer in launching ECPAT (End Child Prostitution and Trafficking).
While the ecumenical alliance has today grown into an international movement, regrettable was the Church’s failure to channel its potential to remedy child abuse within its own portals.
These ecumenical initiatives did not distract Father Desmond away from his primary area of priestly apostolate. He persisted in Church social apostolate through the OHD-sponsored social animation program of BISAs (Bishops’ Institutes of Social Action).
During those years, I found him a profound thinker as well as a committed priest. Always a firm defender of the faith of our fathers, he never hesitated to critique the human failings of its members. As an amiable human being, who could laugh at himself and enjoy a good joke and a good meal, he touched our lives without false sacerdotal pretenses.
Alongside his catholicity of faith, he well loved Asia’s religiosity and Bharath’s genuine Hinduness.
May the enduring apostolic commitment of such priests revive the sagging spirits of struggling social apostles in Asia and challenge the younger generations to the Eucharistic witness of lived-martyrdom.
May the Lord of Life reward Father Desmond for his redemptive love!
(Veteran Asian Church journalist Hector Welgampola from Sri Lanka was the Executive Editor of the Union of Catholic Asian News (UCAN) during 1989-2000. Before UCAN, Hector headed editorial teams of newspapers in Sri Lanka. Since retiring Hector has lived in Australia with his wife, Rita. He authored the resource book Asian Church Glossary and Stylebook.)