On 26 October, the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time, we read the Gospel in which Jesus tells us the parable of the prayer of a Pharisee and a tax collector in the temple. Certainly, Blessed Peter Donders, C.Ss.R., even as a priest, did not pray like the Pharisee. He knelt down, did not elevate himself above others, nor did he buy relationships which are only apparently disarmed with economic concessions. Peter Donders sincerely cared for his neighbour. Like St. Paul, he knew that man’s actions depend on God.
On 27 October, as usual, in Tilburg, we celebrated the birth date of Blessed Peter Donders, C.Ss.R., together with the commemoration of the liberation of the city from German occupation by Scottish troops in 1944, attributed to the intercession of Peter Donders, invoked together with Mary many times during the Second World War. For some years now, on this day, we have been prompted to pray more intensely for peace, considering the ‘Third World War in pieces’, which seems to have no end and causes tensions even in societies that are not directly fighting each other.
This year, the supplication to Blessed Peter Donders C.Ss.R. was followed by a meditative concert with songs of and to Mary, to whom Peter Donders, already from a very young age, frequently turned for his prayer intentions. The concert by Duo Magnificat was a very appropriate continuation of the Mass just celebrated and a moving intensification of our prayers.
Claudia Peters,
vice-postulator Causae Petri Donders C.Ss.R.,
vicepostulator@peerkedonders.nl
