Born in the small town of Guntur in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India on 13th June 1967, I come from a small family which consisted of my parents and a younger brother. My brother is married with two children and after the passing of my father in May 2021, my mother lives with my brother and his wife in my hometown of Guntur.
I joined the religious order of the Divine Word Missionaries (SVD) in 1989 and was subsequently ordained to be a missionary priest on 28th May 1998. I was sent to SVD’s Australian Province in 1999 and have been working ever since in various ministerial roles in Australia and New Zealand. These include a 6-year term as an Assistant Parish Priest of the Te Wairua Tapa – Holy Spirit Parish in Wellington (NZ), followed by another 6-year term as the Rector of SVD Community House in Marsfield and then as a provincial Chaplain at the Westmead Hospital in Sydney for 3 years. Following this, I was assigned as a Parish Priest to the multicultural Parish of St. Maximilian Kolbe in Marsden, Queensland where I served for 7 wonderful years till early 2021.
Appointed now to work at SVD’s Janssen Spirituality Centre (JSC) in Melbourne since July 2021, I feel deeply humbled and greatly privileged to be granted this opportunity to share from my diverse experiences. As a Divine Word missionary, I am committed to advance SVD’s Mission which is centred on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ and to action its charism by what we refer to as ‘Prophetic Dialogue’; which is to interact respectfully with people from other cultures and traditions. Through JSC (also known as Kaurna Centre), we seek to provide a neutral space to inspire narrative and dialogue, welcoming and encouraging those of all faiths and none, to develop their faith/understanding, and to promote knowledge-sharing with respect amongst members of different faiths.
To this effect, I warmly welcome parishes, groups, teams and individuals to consider our facility to either host your events or to attend any of our various program offerings. I look forward to working with you and am particularly interested in establishing lay partnerships to collaborate and promote inter-faith dialogue with special focus on young people, against the backdrop of a very challenging era of uncertainty in Australian history.
Drawing courage and strength from this prayer of our venerated founder St. Arnold Janssen, I look forward to undertaking my Mission in this role with hope and faith…
