Visitation - the heartbeat of SVP : (February 2006)

In Jesus' description of how the father will judge the sheep and the goats, one of the categories of how we serve the Lord is in visiting those who are ill or in prison.

Visitation is the heart-beat of most conferences of the SVP.

Now that the festive season is over with all its expectation, excitement and excess, the dull darks days of February are for many a time of low spirits, doubt and even depression.

This is a time when the visitation tradition of the SVP can be at a premium. We put much energy into the festive build up with arranging hampers and toys and all else that goes to making the difference for so many families.

Fr Perry Gildea - Vincentian Fathers

Cliftonville Road, Belfast 15

Vincent helps the sick

Archived Reflections....click here

A different and more gentle energy is required now, the energy to create time to visit, to listen, to show solicitude for lonely, the housebound, those in nursing homes or prisons.

At our meetings we pray for a fruitful visit. How do we measure such fruitfulness? Is it in the smile that greets you as the door opens, or the warmth of the handshake? Or is it in the reluctance to see you leave?

We pray that we may give our time generously and this surely applies to visitation more that anything else.

Time is a most precious gift, we all have only our allotted amount and how we use it for the sake of others matters. Sharing time, spending time with and for others is part of the vocation and mission of the Vincentian.

In these dark days before spring it might be the greatest gift we can bring to those we visit. In the words of a more recent hymn "when I needed a neighbour, were you there?"

"Lord, when did we see you sick or in prison and go to see you?" and the King will answer, "I tell you solemnly, in so far as you did this to one of the least of these brothers or sisters of mine, you did it to me".

Fr Perry (February 2006)