Seminarians on retreat in Kalaupapa, June 25-29, chat with Bishop Larry Silva in a pavilion. (Photo courtesy of diocesan Vocations Office)
For the past two summers, Diocese of Honolulu vocations director Father Rheo Ofalsa and Bishop Larry Silva have traveled with diocesan seminarians to the Kalaupapa peninsula for a five-day retreat.
The trip includes Mass, prayer time and recreation. It also allows the seminarians to deepen their spiritual formation and their knowledge of Bishop Silva and the diocese, said Father Ofalsa.
Not only does Kalaupapa lack most cell phone coverage, there’s not much “to do” there, the vocations director said. And that’s the point.
“I want guys to learn how to be bored with one another,” Father Ofalsa said. “It’s like family. Not needing to be entertained but they can spend time with one another. Let conversations and events happen very organically.”
Throughout the retreat, June 25-29, the seminarians sat by the beach and had casual talks with Bishop Silva on different topics relating to priesthood. That allows them to get to know the bishop on a more personal level.
Father Ofalsa said that being in Kalaupapa, surrounded by the history of the Hansen’s disease settlement there, the seminarians are reminded that while leprosy is no longer a health problem in most of the world, there are people who remain isolated. That might be because of mental health issues, HIV/AIDS, prison, poverty or something else.
“I want our men to be able to go out and enter into that isolation and bring people back,” he said.
“I want our men to have that kind of experience, to understand that when they are diocesan priests, that’s their mission,” Father Ofalsa said.
“Not just to be comfortable in the rectories in their parishes. But to truly go out and enter into the isolation of people who might be living in a community but without communion. People that might be alone in a group of people.”
More photos of the retreat:
