In September of 2024, our Slovak Redemptorist Mission began its 7th year of mission in Lithuania and our mission horizons started to widen. We shall be cooperating with our confreres from the Warsaw province in a parish mission beyond the Lithuania´s borders. We shall be leading a parish mission together in May this year in Puńsk in Poland (south-west of Lithuania) where the majority of believers (75 %) are Lithuanian. Our community and our Polish confreres were able to meet with the parish priest and his vicar in Puńsk to plan the event.
We are also looking to the north of Lithuania, to Latvia. We have had repeated invitations and a request to help with or cooperate in a mission in this country. There has been a long-standing history of personal relationships between those involved in evangelisation in Slovakia, Latvia and Lithuania.
In November of 2024 we conducted a short renewal mission for the Effata community that works closely with the Archbishop of Riga, Mgr. Zbignevs Stankevics. The archbishop, a close friend of the Redemptorists from his time in seminary, has been in dialogue with the Redemptorists about continued cooperation in missions in Latvia. He has cooperated in mission with the Redemptorists of Slovakia especially with the mission fellowship of River of Life (Rieka Života) for more than 20 years. In the summer of 1996 a group of Latvians together with groups of many other nations of Eastern Europe spent the summer at the Mission School in the monastery of the Redemptorists in Podolínec. It was a period of rebirth when a number of international summer mission schools took place, mostly in Poland and Slovakia. Many speakers and ministers from all over the world came to help the countries that were behind the iron curtain for more than 40 years and were often silenced and deeply wounded by the totalitarian communist regime. The Church from the West helped immensely at that time. It took time for the former Eastern block to regain the courage and skills to proclaim the Gospel boldly. Among those who came from the West to minister at these schools were evangelisers and ministers like Dave Nodar (Christlife), Peter Herbeck (Renewal Ministries), Tom Forest C.Ss.R, Michelle Moran, Don Turbit (Renewal Ministries), Colin Symes (Scotland), Neal Lozano (Unbound miniseries), Noel Chircop (Malta), Andrzej Sionek and his team (Missio Christi, Poland) and others.
February 2025 – Formation time for a community Efatta in Riga 
Fr. Rastislav Dluhý preaching at the event of Effata community. Riga, February 2025.
The Lord is putting on our hearts the whole Baltic region (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia). We strive to listen, discern and respond. At present our cooperation consists of short-term missions and formation outreaches. We were able to minister to communities of Latvians in Riga, (7-9 November 2024 and 13-15 February 2025). We also met several times with the Ambassador to Latvia and Lithuania during our stay in Riga and talked about the situation in Latvia. Our last mission outreach took place not long time ago (21-23 February) in Aglona which is a national Marian shrine for Latvians. A group of three men, under the leadership of Bohuš Živčák from the River of Life (a Lay Mission community working with the Redemptorists) conducted a retreat for one hundred men. The missionaries also met with the Archbishop of Riga, Mgr Zbignevs Stankevics.
Every year a Mission school takes place in Kaunas. It consists of four weekends and a series of mission outreaches. Not a long ago the Provincial of Redemptorists of Bratislava – Prague, Fr. Jozef Mihok led a weekend on kerygma at a Mission School in Kaunas, 7-9 February. He was able to encourage the local community of Redemptorists and meet with the Archbishop of Kaunas. We had two participants from Latvia. In future we woud like to open the doors of the Mission school to the whole Baltic region. It is a consistent patient effort of making small steps.
Frs. Rastislav and Lukáš spent the end of the year of 2024 and the first day of 2025 together with university youth from Kaunas in Tallinn. They also took part in a European Taize gathering. There was time to learn a little about the situation of the local church from active Estonian Catholics as well as Protestant brothers and sisters. A very special moment was the meeting of a young Lituanian in the Catholic Cathedral with a Bishop of the newly established diocese of Tallinn. There are officially only 4,500 Catholics in Tallinn. It was moving to hear him say: “Imagine, in 1960 there were officially only five Catholics in Estonia. So our numbers are gradually growing.” His sharing about the Taize meeting was very touching : “This city, this nation has been very blessed by the Taize meeting. Yesterday I got three e-mails from young people who took part in Taize meeting expressing a desire to become Catholics and to be baptised.”
One of the most powerful symbols of solidarity and friendship of the whole Baltic region was a momentous event that would forever leave its mark on history. On August 23, 1989, two million people joined hands, creating an unbroken human chain that spanned over 600 kilometres, linking the capital cities of Vilnius in Lithuania, Tallin in Estoni and Riga in Latvia. This awe-inspiring display of unity and determination became famously known as ‘The Baltic Way’. It was a peaceful protest against the illegal Soviet occupation and also one of the earliest and longest unbroken human chains in history.
Our ministry desires to make another chain, a missionary one, of solidarity and friendship in mission in the present era.
Fr. Rastislav Dluhý, C.Ss.R.
Superior of Kaunas kommunity (Lithuania)
