Below you will find our International Coordinator, John Sullivan III’s reflections on his trip throughout Africa and Uganda to help the leadership teams spread the Flame of Love of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. (Summer 2024)
Greetings to everyone from Kenya. I’m about halfway through the trip to Africa in terms of countries. Thus far, the trip has been a powerful demonstration of how our Blessed Mother has everything in control and her plans are better than ours!
The trip to Africa actually began with a conference in England. Many thanks to Liz, Csaba, and team for all the work they did to organize it. I am delighted to see that there is good growth in a country that is so deeply secular.
From England, I flew to Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo via Switzerland. For the last leg of the trip, after praying about where to sit, I changed my seat from the one I had been assigned. The gentleman next to me looked like he might be a priest. We struck up a conversation and he asked what I was doing. I told him I was going to Goma to visit our people and speak about the Flame of Love and that we had hoped to set up a meeting with the Bishop. He then said that he was the Bishop of Goma! So we had our meeting right there in the plane as well as other delightful conversation.
The situation in Goma is unique. There are two organizations for the Flame of Love – the Movement and the Community. The Movement refers to the Association of the Faithful to which we belong. The Community refers to a religious order Sister Alvera desires to establish for the Flame of Love. Although I am sure this order will work closely with the Association, it is technically separate and would be under the Bishop. Where do I begin to discuss all that I learned in Goma without writing a novel!
One important item that consistently came up was the need for formation. When new countries come on now, I spend many, many months with them to help them learn the Flame of Love and prepare them to teach others. I do not believe that happened with the countries established in the past, at least not in DRC. This was highlighted by the Bishop. He was ready to approve them as a religious order until those evaluating the Community pointed out the lack of formation and formators. Thus, they have been given another three years by the Bishop to address the issues.
On the other hand, even though they have had little formal formation, they are a living demonstration that knowledge is not the most important thing. Our Blessed Mother and the Holy Spirit still work miracles in the depth of hearts whether we understand it academically or not. They have a remarkable reputation among the Bishop and his advisors. They see them as the group that makes things happen in their parishes and who truly live their Christianity. Thank you Sister Alvera and members for living the Flame of Love of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and setting such a powerful example.
Delivering formation is a challenge. Bandwidth is expensive and not reliable so it is not feasible to constantly watch videos on-line. Consequently, we will work on creating French subtitles for the formation videos we have and shipping them on USB sticks. We have most of the Building on Solid Rock series done and are starting work on the Overview videos. We are also in the process of placing these on the flameoflove.info web site.
Materials are also a challenge. We will want to customize the materials to DRC so that, as they circulate throughout the country, people are directed back to our people in DRC. In this way, we continually build the local Movements. However, our members are financially challenged. I was privileged to be able to stay with them. The needs of the orphanage are great especially now that war has returned. The house for the men’s community is very sparse with no plumbing or kitchen. I was deeply inspired to see their commitment to establishing the Community despite such living conditions. Thank you again for your example. We will need to see how we can raise funds so that we can have materials to help the Movement grow throughout the country and, if possible, assist the Community and orphanage. This is a somewhat delicate matter as I know many other countries are also quite poor not only in Africa but in Oceania and Latin America so we will have to see how to fairly balance our limited resources to help.
We visited the Chancery to meet again with the Bishop and with the Director for Lay Associations. The reception was more than we could have hoped for. They would like us to introduce the Flame of Love to all the parishes in the diocese and to present to all of their priests. For the latter, I will likely need to return to Goma in 2025. For the former, it comes back to formation. We will need to quickly execute this formation program so that our people in Goma are able to visit each one of the parishes. I am hopeful that we can accomplish this within the year.
Peace and great Joy – John
| Uganda was next after Goma. This was an entirely different kind of visit. In Goma, our emphasis was meeting with Flame of Love devotees, the Bishop, and other important priests in the diocesan administration. In Uganda, the doors flew open to reach large numbers of people who had never heard of the Flame of Love. I hope I can remember all that we did with the help of Philomena (as I found Phiona prefers to be called) and her team. Once again, whenever it seemed like something was going wrong, it was our Blessed Mother giving us a better plan. The first stop was a youth centre in Kampala with two wonderfully supportive priests. There were hundreds of people in attendance. It was a delight to sit around before the events and chat with dedicated and enthusiastic teenagers who were glowing with the Flame of Love of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We also had an interview with Holy Cross Kisubi who live streamed and broadcast many of the events in Kampala. Philomena was well prepared with many materials – prayer cards, abridged diaries, pictures, t-shirts both for sale and to give away. Many thanks to the members in Uganda who dug deeply to finance this printing and the trip as well as those countries who contributed to supporting materials in Africa. A particular thanks to Ireland and New Zealand. One of Philomena’s sons happens to own a print shop so he was able to deliver the materials on short notice and continue printing as we had need during the trip. |
The next day began the main activity in Uganda – preaching at the novena for peace leading up to the solemnity of the Assumption at Kiramirembe, a large Marian shrine dedicated to our Lady Queen of Peace. Kiramirembe means “give us peace”. The challenge as a speaker was that each day had both people who were attending the entire novena and others who were new for that day. The first two days, I covered what I have been covering wherever I go – the scope of the Flame of Love, i.e., a gift for the whole world and not just a new prayer group, and the importance of sacrifice in lighting the Flame of Love like a wildfire to change the world. After that, I did a brief overview each day and then covered much of the material in the Building on Solid Rock series. The first few days there were scores of people but the numbers kept growing. By the vigil of the Assumption, there were probably thousands. Besides those in attendance, most of these activities were live streamed by Holy Cross Kisubi and I believe that the vigil was broadcast on Radio Maria. Assumption was celebrated by the Archbishop of Kampala who invited us to dinner afterward and sat me directly across from him at the table along with the Prime Minister and a former Ambassador. Thanks be to God, the response seemed to be tremendous. Even on our trip to Kibeho and at Kibeho people would stop us and comment that they saw us at Kiramirembe. However, just as inspiring as the reception among the masses of people was the enthusiastic reception among many, many priests. I am sure the Uganda team will be invited into many parishes.
There was something else fascinating about Kiramirembe. There is a beautiful but mysterious statue of our Blessed Mother there. No one know where it came from or who sent it. It was in the railroad station during the looting of the Uganda civil war. Literally everything was looted but they opened this box and saw a life-sized white woman, thought it was a coffin with a dead person, and sealed it back up. It remained in storage for many years until it was offered to Kiramirembe. I’ll attach a picture. Look at her heart. Both Father Kabanda and I noticed it. It is as if she was waiting all these years for the Flame of Love to come to Uganda and Kiramirembe!
Since the Kiramirembe activities started at 2PM, we scheduled other activities for the mornings. One was to visit the various shrines to the Ugandan martyrs and the first missionaries. The tortures inflicted upon these men were horrifying but there is something that impressed me even more, viz., the initiative of the laity. When the missionaries first came, they baptized six people but then recieved instructions that they needed to catechize for four years before baptism. They prevailed to reduce it to two years and baptized another six. However, they were soon forced to leave. They left behind 12 baptized and 200 catechumens. When they returned a few years later, they expected that what they started would have died and they’d have to start over again. Instead, those baptized took it upon themselves to catechize others in the absence of the priests. When the missionaries returned, they found 80,000 people waiting for them! As I wrote previously, step out and take the initiative. As Jesus told Elizabeth, go far outside your comfort zone like the Wise Men. These Uganda lay people realized there was a job to do – priests or no priests – and what a job they did. Let us follow their example and be about our Mother’s work.
We scheduled an interview on Radio Maria and, in another “seating” event, it just so happened at breakfast the day before, I was sitting next to the Director of Radio Maria! During the interview, the interviewer and the Station Manager seemed to be completely enflamed by the Flame of Love. The interviewer said he literally felt it. The Manager texted me several times afterward. I pray this leads to a great spread of the Flame of Love as Radio Maria has sixteen stations throughout Uganda.
We also had an interview with Catholic TV. We recorded three segments. After we finished, they requested if we could come back to do another segment, but they would have to clear it with their management. That did not happen in time before we left but I pray it will be another great media outlet to spread the Flame of Love.
Our Mother’s “redirection” was evident again after Kiramirembe. We had planned to go to Fort Portal, a large Archdiocese in the west that has been receptive to the Flame of Love. That’s where Sarah is. However, the bishop was not available to give his permission and the people to whom he referred us were out of the country or unavailable but that allowed us to take an overnight trip to Tororo in the East instead of a day trip. Even that seemed a disappointment as the monk who invited us wanted us to present to the cathedral parish but the rector said we needed the bishop’s permission and it had not come through in time. But, we were invited to the Monastery. This was an unexpected great blessing. Virtually all the monks fully embraced the Flame of Love – over 30 Benedictines! Philomena supplied abridged diaries to many of them. Thanks again to those who helped pay for them. We pray that this enthusiastic response of the monastery will open the door to the Bishop. In fact, the next day, we did meet with one of the Bishop’s advisors. He asked many questions because, as he shared, he has had other groups come into the diocese that caused problems and thought they knew better than the Magisterium of the Church. This is a very serious issue; please let us not fall into the trap of pride. Thankfully, he seemed very satisfied with our answers and I trust the door will open.
We then returned to the Saint Padre Pio Shrine in Kampala where, one again with the encouragement of a very supportive priest, Father Michael, several hundred gathered most of whom were completely new to the Flame of Love. He said something in conversation afterward that remains lodged in my thoughts. He said that Catholics in Uganda understand faith, but they have not yet learned love. They come to Church, they are faithful, but they have not given themselves over to a life of love – the sacrificial love of the Trinity that we must live and learn in the Flame of Love. I suspect this is not unique to Uganda. When I speak, the Flame of Love itself does not take much time to explain; it’s very simple. Most of my time is spent talking about love and grace as many Christians do not understand them and, if we don’t understand love and grace, we will never understand the Flame of Love and how it blinds Satan.
The next day, we left for Masaka in the south on our way to Kibeho. Here, we stopped at a Marian shrine under construction in a very rural part of Uganda. They awaited are arrival late that evening. Father Peter is ardent about the Flame of Love and shared the many miracles that had happened at the shrine because of the Flame of Love – both miraculous conversions and the triumph over the very strong demonic influence that had infested the hill where the shrine is being built.
From there, our tired group of members from the Kampala Flame of Love continued our long journey to Kibeho but, since this instalment is so long already, I’ll stop here and write separately about Rwanda and Kenya. May our Blessed Mother start her wildfire over Uganda, Africa, and the whole world! – John
Trip To Rwanda.
After traveling all day to Masaka, our tired group and amazing driver continued on through the night toward Kibeho, Rwanda, where Mary appeared before the Rwandan genocide. Here again, we could see our Blessed Mother directing our seemingly stumblng steps. We had originally been invited to Kibeho by Father Gaspar, a Pallottine priest serving at the shrine at Kibeho. However, by the time the trip was scheduled, he had been transferred to the Pallottine Community in the capital city of Kigali. Again, this appeared to be a setback but was a great blessing. We decided to stop in Kigali to visit him anyway.
As he toured us through the compound in Kigali, he took us through a large printing facility. I thought, if they are printing, they must also be shipping and shipping full diaries into Africa has been a nightmare for us. We are often told they cannot be delivered even to major cities and, even when we are told they can be delivered, they are returned or they disappear. Father Gaspar introduced me to Father Jean Paul in charge of the printing facility and he is interested in printing materials including the full Diary for us in Africa. They need to do runs of at least 1000 copies but they will store them for us for free and can distribute them by sending them via the members of their Order as they travel to the various Pallottine Communities spread throughout Africa or they can piggyback them on air shipments they make of other materials. I pray this will solve our Diary problem in Africa. We are in preliminary discussions. This would not have happened had our plans gone as we expected.
We finally arrived in Kibeho after what seemed like a day and a half of continuous driving. I can’t say enough about our driver – another one of Philomena’s “sons” who owns a safari company. Again, I don’t have his card handy but will share his web site when I can just in case any of your are ever planning a safari to East Africa. Andrew was amazing – driving endless hours safely over, at times, seemingly impassable roads. He took over one week off from running his business to drive us all over Uganda and Rwanda. Thank you Andrew.
Even in Kibeho, our Mother’s planning was at work. I did not share it with Philomena but I was wondering what we were doing in Kibeho. I greatly appreciated the opportunity to be at a place where Mary appeared but I did not come to Africa for my own spiritual enrichment but to serve. Why was I here if we now had no presentations? Well, our Blessed Mother knew better. We met some people who I believe were greatly blessed by the Flame of Love. I also had a chance to spend valuable time with our Kampala team. Most stunningly, we visited a Bible museum – a great idea to help Catholics make better use of the Bible. As I was leaving, my eyes happened to meet with a gentleman who appeared to be a priest. We paused and he came over to shake my hand. He happened to be a bishop from Zambia – a country where the Flame of Love is just starting. He was quite engaged, took our contact details and has since been in contact with both Philomena and myself including saying he would welcome my visit to his diocese. I pray this will happen in 2025.
I was struck in Kibeho by the resonance between our Blessed Mother’s messages there and the Flame of Love. In Kibeho, Mary said that we had forgotten how to love and the way to peace. This echoed Father Michael’s words that Uganda (and certainly many others) understand faith but not love. This is one of the great gifts Mary gives us in the Flame of Love – confronting us with what love means and providing the extraodinary example of how Jesus taught Elizabeth to love in every moment. Mary also spoke of the importance of suffering and how no one will make to Heaven without suffering. She also mentioned the importance of praying without hypocrisy. This strikes close to home for me on two fronts. I have been trying to emphasize how we must not just say our prayers but live our prayers – prayer and sacrifice as we can only learn love by living love. And the other is to encourage our people to pray as a loving dialog rather than a recitation. Let’s please not speak to God as if He is in the next room – “May God do this or do that” addressing Him in the third person – rather talk to our family in the Rosary as we meditate on the mysteries – talking to them in the second person.
From Kibeho, we journeyed the five hours back to Kigali for my flight to Kenya after which the group continued back home to Kampala – a trip that I believe took over 20 hours. Again, my admiration for Andrew and my deep thanks to the Kampala team for a memorable trip together.
Visit to Cameroun
From Kenya, it was now time to fly to the other side of Africa, West Africa, and the first stop was Cameroon. This was a blessed and joyous trip though it just about killed me and the group who were with me. I was accompanied the entire trip by Dr. Ngadjui, the current Africa Continental Coordinator, Monsignor Toko, the Continental Spiritual Advisor, Father Francis Rhufin, the National Coordinator, and Martine, the African Continental Treasurer who initially enountered the Flame of Love in 1988 so a long time devotee; I am assuming she encountered the small booklets that were published from Switzerland while Elizabeth was still alive. The challenge was that I was up by 7AM the day I flew to Cameroon but my flight was not until the evening. It was a long flight with a 9 hour layover in Nairobi that I thought I would use for sleep but I was not allowed to check-in until 2AM so no sleep that night. I landed in Cameroon on-time but our challenge there was that our people are spread out on opposite sides of the country so, from the airport, it was a 8 hour drive to Belabo where we ended at 3:30 the next morning, then arose at 5AM for a 1 hour drive to Bertua to meet with the Bishop and Father Francis Rhhufin’s parish followed by a 9 hour drive to Bafang which lasted until the early morning and then straightaway without any sleep that night for a 6 hour ride back to the airport in Younde to head to Togo! Thank you to the Cameroon team for such endurance.
Belabo was wonderful. Our people waited until we arrived late at night and greeted us with dancing, marimbas and drums, singing, and great joy. After speaking to our people, we shared a meal until the early morning. From there, we drove to meet with the very supportive Bishop of Bertua. I asked him what he saw as the most valuable contribution the Flame of Love could make to his diocese and he replied, “teaching our people to pray”. I found that fascinating and unexpected as I was still digesting Father Michael’s comment in Uganda about teaching the parishioners to love. This reinforces my earlier comments about how we pray. Let us please be sure that our prayers, our cenacles, are a dialog of love with our beloved family and not a recitation of a prayer formula. Remember, our Blessed Mother doesn’t need another “prayer formula”; she wants to shake the world.
From there, we went to Father Francis Rhufin’s parish. I had forgotten the schedule so thought we were just stopping in. Instead, I was greeted with the same joy and singing and a delightful little girl welcoming me in English with a bouquet of flowers. After speaking there, we left for the long drive to the other side of the country to visit Bafang. Once again, we arrived quite late but our people were joyfully waiting. After Mass and speaking there, we once again shared a meal where I ate with the bishop’s representative as the bishop was out of town. He also was engaged and supportive.
At the end of this trip, we once again experienced what I pray was our Blessed Mother’s orchestration. Dr. Ngadjui had produced a large report about the Flame of Love in Africa and wanted me to take copies to Togo and Cote d’Ivoire since mailing them is a challenge in Africa. We did not have time to put them in my luggage before leaving as we were in a hurry for the airport. I can’t imagine how tired our driver was and, to make matters worse, the weather was poor and visibility very low so driving was dangerous and much slower than expected and we were late for the flight. In fact, the final drive in Younde was heart stopping – I think even for the team from Cameroon who are much more familiar with such risky driving than I am! We arrived after check-in for my flight had closed. Dr. Ngadjui wanted me to take the reports but I told him I did not have time to repack my luggage to fit them since I was already overloaded. He then suggested I simply carry them in my hand which I did. Thankfully, the airline let me check in. As I raced to the gate, I plopped the reports I was holding on a chair as we were preparing to board. As I confirmed I was in the right place with a gentleman in front of me, he asked if I was a priest. He had noticed the reports about the Flame of Love of the Immaculate Heart of Mary which were now unexpectedly exposed instead of in my luggage. It turns out he is a very well-known and high ranking priest in Nigeria who travels around the world to preach. He took my card and seemed interested as he greatly loves the Virgin Mary. I do pray this helps us to finally light the Flame of Love in Nigeria. This would not have happened if we were on-time for the flight.
Many thanks to the Cameroon team for creating such a joyful and welcoming trip despite that challenges of travel.
Peace and great Joy in our Blessed Mother’s service – John