“I joyfully greet all the participants in this online meeting on Redemptorist Social Works. This moment offers a precious opportunity to meet, even if virtually, for reflection and to strengthen our mission alongside the most vulnerable, who in the Redemptorist tradition are the poorest and most abandoned.” With these words, Father Rogério Gomes began his message to the participants in the online meeting with Redemptorist Social Works, held on September 22.
He emphasized that service to society, aimed at restoring life, justice, and dignity to our brothers and sisters, is a profoundly missionary task. “Goodness makes no distinctions, it does not calculate advantages; it is disinterested and gratuitous. It is a force that humanizes relationships, breaks down the barriers of prejudice and indifference, and builds bridges of brotherhood.” Thus, every act of kindness becomes a participation in Christ’s redeeming love, a concrete witness to the Gospel, and a commitment to those who suffer.
In light of the Gospel and the social doctrine of the Church, Father Rogério outlined a comprehensive perspective: Redemptorist social works are called not only to offer immediate responses to the urgent needs of the poor and abandoned, but also to act prophetically in denouncing injustices, promoting inclusive public policies, defending human rights, and forming aware and supportive citizens.
Concluding his remarks, he referred to the Jubilee Year and the year dedicated to the Redemptorist Mission: “On this Jubilee journey, we remember that goodness and beauty, combined with hope, have the capacity to save people completely, and transformed people can save the world. For this reason, our social works are not limited to providing assistance but become a true proclamation of the Gospel through concrete gestures of care, solidarity, and justice.”
The meeting was attended by approximately 50 participants, including lay people and confreres from around the world. Fr. Cristian Bueno CSsR, secretary of the General Secretariat for Evangelization was the moderator who facilitated the online meeting. The event was an opportunity for learning and sharing, as it was the first time a specific meeting was held with Redemptorist social works.
Read the message from Father General >>
Some examples of social works in different countries of the world
The social works promoted by the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (Redemptorists) stem from the heart of the evangelizing mission: to proclaim the Good News to the poor and abandoned. On several continents, the Redemptorists have launched social initiatives that integrate faith and concrete solidarity, responding to the most urgent needs of local communities.
Africa and Madagascar:
In Kenya, Nigeria, Madagascar, and South Africa, the Redemptorists support educational, and healthcare projects aimed at improving the lives of marginalized people. Among these initiatives are vocational and technical training for young people in rural Kenya. In Madagascar, maternity clinics and medical dispensaries provide basic healthcare.
Brazil:
Vila São Cottolengo, a philanthropic hospital now recognized as a Center Specialized in Physical, Auditory, and Intellectual Rehabilitation (CER-III), is dedicated to welcoming and caring for people with multiple disabilities and socially vulnerable conditions. In Juiz de Fora (Massachusetts), the Padre Nilton Fagundes Hauck Social Assistance Center offers psychosocial services, socio-educational sessions, and cultural workshops. A similar commitment is pursued by the Centro Santíssimo Redentor in Aparecida (Spain).
India:
In Kerala, the Alphonsian Social Assistance Center provides free mobile palliative care to over 170 families, counselling services, and assistance to the elderly. In Mumbai and Nasik, the I Will Learn project provides non-formal education to children from marginalized communities, with courses in English, computer science, and mathematics. The Vice Province of Majella also supports Adivasi migrants with cultural and social initiatives aimed at strengthening solidarity and community identity.
Thailand:
Sarnelli House, founded by Father Michael Shea, C.Ss.R., offers shelter and assistance to orphaned and HIV-infected children, providing medical care, education, and protection. In Pattaya, the Fr. Ray Foundation, established in 1974 by Redemptorist missionary Raymond Brennan, provides support to abandoned children, young people with disabilities, and minors in need, with the motto: “We never turn a needy child away. “
Mexico and the U.S. border:
At the Reynosa border (Tamaulipas), the Redemptorists work to help migrants with reception services, legal assistance, and material support. In San Luis Potosí, they have created community spaces that offer shelter and a safe environment for those on the move.
Europe
In Poland, the Redemptorist Social Services Center provides concrete assistance to people in crisis: housing assistance, food and clothing distribution, legal and medical support. In Warsaw, the Redemptorists provide after-school programs and shelter for children displaced by the war in Ukraine. In Spain, the NGO “Acoger y Compartir” organizes humanitarian transport to Ukraine, coordinated with the Parish of the Most Holy Redeemer in Madrid.
International Volunteering
Redemptorist Volunteer Ministries (St. Clement Province) offers young people the opportunity to dedicate a year of service in schools, soup kitchens, and shelters, fostering an experience of human and spiritual growth.
These works demonstrate how Redemptorist missionary commitment goes beyond the proclamation of faith, but translates into concrete, daily service to those living on the margins. Solidarity thus becomes a living expression of the Gospel, embodied in the diverse cultural and social realities of the world.
Message on the occasion of the Online Meeting of the General Council with confreres in Redemptorist Social Ministry
- I greet with joy all the participants of this Online Meeting on Redemptorist Social Ministry, a moment that constitutes a valuable opportunity for meeting, even if virtual, for reflection and strengthening of our mission together with the most vulnerable, who in the Redemptorist tradition are the poorest and most abandoned. I express my sincere gratitude to the confreres and professionals in the various areas who, with dedication and generosity, dedicate themselves every day to the service of the life, justice and dignity of our brothers and sisters, because this service that we offer to society is of the utmost importance: it is not simply a matter of fulfilling a social duty, but it is a profoundly missionary task. I also thank in a special way the translators and all those who collaborated in the preparation of this meeting, making it a space of communion and hope in the missionary journey that we share.
- In the play The Idiot there is a famous phrase attributed to Dostoyevsky: “Beauty will save the world”. Today, more than ever, this statement resonates strongly, because we live in a world full of beauty, but at the same time deeply torn apart by violence, wars, injustice and social inequalities that make it saddened and marked by suffering. Inspired by this thought of Dostoevsky, I believe that in the context of Redemptorist Social Ministry we can affirm: “Goodness will save the world”. This phrase has resonated in my heart for a long time, especially when I visited the Sarnelli House social work in Nong Khai, Thailand, on the border with Laos, which takes in orphaned children living with HIV. Those children, deprived of their parents, found in our center a family, treatment and the possibility of living with dignity; and as I looked at that reality, I understood clearly that goodness will indeed save the world.
- I think then of the different social works that we carry out in so many parts of the world: the schools and hospitals in Madagascar; the Fr. Ray Foundation, with its various areas of social care in Thailand; the initiatives dedicated to cancer patients and the many works in favor of migrants in India; the Villa San Cottolengo; the centers for chemical dependents and the Social Assistance Centers in Brazil; the centers for attention to migrants and homeless people in North America; children’s centres in Indonesia; and so many other experiences that I have had the opportunity to know. I apologize for not being able to mention all the social works that exist, and I recognize that there will even be some that I do not know, but all of them bear the Redemptorist stamp.
- These works, animated by the Redemptorist Missionaries together with generous collaborators and benefactors, save lives and offer dignity to people who are often discarded by society. We welcome them. And it is precisely there that the truth of this conviction is revealed: goodness will save the world.
- Kindness is the inner disposition that impels us to go out to meet the other, to recognize him as a neighbor and to treat him with the dignity that is proper to him as a human being. It springs from a heart open to love and is manifested in concrete gestures of acceptance, listening and solidarity. Kindness makes no distinctions, calculates no advantages; it is disinterested and gratuitous. It is a force that humanizes relationships, breaks down the barriers of prejudice and indifference and builds bridges of fraternity. In Biblical terms, the quintessential example of goodness is the parable of the Good Samaritan (cf. Lk 10:25-37), in which a man, moved by compassion, approaches the wounded man on the road, heals his wounds and restores his dignity. Kindness saves and brings life back!
- In the Letter to the Galatians, Paul presents goodness as one of the fruits of the Spirit (cf. Gal 5:22). From the Christian perspective, it is a reflection of God himself, who in his Son Jesus became close to the poor and abandoned. Goodness manifests the divine heart and, at the same time, is called to flourish in the human heart. Thus, every act of goodness is participation in Christ’s redemptive love, concrete witness to the Gospel and commitment to those who suffer. In this sense, those who serve, confreres, lay collaborators and professionals, are not simply fulfilling a paid work function, but are carrying out a mission, living their vocation to promote human dignity. In other words, they believe that kindness saves the world.
- Our social work is in harmony with the so-called works of mercy, both corporal and spiritual. In a Redemptorist perspective, it is a matter of saving the person in an integral way, as the Redemptorist Constitution 5 reminds us: “The mission entrusted to the Congregation to evangelize the poor includes the liberation and salvation of the whole human person. Those gathered must explicitly proclaim the Gospel, stand in solidarity with the poor and promote their fundamental rights of justice and freedom, using the means that are most in conformity with the Gospel and, at the same time, most effective”. In this sense, Redemptorist social works are an application of the Gospel in the concrete life of people, bringing them from the existential peripheries to the centre of welcome and care.
- Every Redemptorist work is called to promote the social values inherent in the dignity of the human person, which foster his authentic integral development: truth, freedom, justice and love (cf. Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, 197). In addition to the concrete assistance we offer in our centres, it is essential to generate strategies that awaken a greater awareness of social justice. The Compendium of Social Doctrine affirms that “social justice is a requirement linked to the social question, which today manifests itself with a global dimension; concerns the social, political and economic aspects and, above all, the structural dimension of the problems and the corresponding solutions” (n. 201). In this sense, Redemptorist social works are called not only to offer immediate responses to the urgent needs of the poor and abandoned, but also to act prophetically in denouncing injustices, promoting inclusive public policies, defending human rights, and forming conscious and supportive citizens. It is therefore a matter of combining concrete closeness to the most vulnerable, the poorest and most abandoned, with a transforming vision of society, so that, inspired by the Gospel and by the Redemptorist charism, we can collaborate in the construction of a more just, fraternal world where goodness is present.
- If goodness saves the world, through social ministry we also rescue beauty. Where society discards, we welcome with the beauty of the embrace; where the pain of exclusion and indifference wounds, we carry the beauty of consolation; and where people seem stripped of their human condition, we clothe them with the beautiful garments of dignity. Thus, goodness and beauty come together to save the human being from dehumanization and transform the world into a place for everyone.
- Goodness and beauty, when lived in the light of the Redemptorist charism, reveal the merciful heart of the Redeemer that bends down over the poorest and most abandoned. In the Redemptorist mission, goodness becomes the Redeemer’s concrete presence in the existential peripheries, while beauty is manifested in the restored dignity of each person who returns to smile, to believe, to hope and to live. In this way, our social works are not mere services, but sacraments of hope, signs of the Abundant Redemption that embraces the totality of human life. Where goodness becomes a gesture and beauty becomes a witness, the world experiences here and now the signs of the Kingdom of God that is coming for all.
- We are living the Jubilee of Hope, a time of grace that invites us to renew our trust in God and to reaffirm our commitment to the poorest and most abandoned. In harmony with the Year dedicated to Mission, illuminated by the theme: “The Lord who sends us as Missionaries and Pilgrims of Hope in a wounded world”, we are called to recognize that hope is a force that sustains and gives meaning to our missionary action. On this Jubilee journey, we remember that goodness and beauty, together with hope, have the capacity to save people in their entirety, and transformed people can save the world. For this reason, our social works are not limited to providing assistance, but become a true proclamation of the Gospel through concrete gestures of care, solidarity and justice, showing that Abundant Redemption is still alive and transforming, and that it is capable of making the world a place of coexistence for all, without social exclusion. political, sexual, cultural or religious. We are Missionaries of Hope!
- Dear confreres, lay people and all the professionals who collaborate with the Redemptorist mission in our social ministry continue to make the world more beautiful through the goodness that is born of the Gospel and the ethics of care for others. The Lord calls us not to be discouraged in the face of difficulties, but to persevere with hope, because every gesture of acceptance, service and compassion is a living sign of Abundant Redemption. Let us remain firm in this commitment, certain that this goodness and beauty are gifts that the Lord entrusts us to in order to place them fully at his service.
- May Mary, Mother of Charity, together with our Saints, Blessed and Martyrs, encourage and inspire us in this mission of serving, through our social ministry, those who are marginalized and forgotten by society. May we never lack the courage to remember and witness that goodness and beauty, rooted in the Gospel, have the power to save the world.
Fr. Rogério Gomes, C.Ss.R.
Superior General
Rome, 22 September 2025
Original: Spanish
