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A Year at FMS: One Volunteer’s Reflection

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Domestic Volunteer Susie Zagar, who began working at FMS in July 2011, reflects her year of service at Franciscan Mission Service.


Planting a prayer in the garden during our Peace Pole Event in August 2010.

It is hard to believe that a year could go by so fast, yet it is already August 2011, just a little over a year from when I began working at Franciscan Mission Service as a full-time domestic volunteer. I reflect on how God led me to FMS and the gift that it has been in my life during the course of the year, the people I have met, the chance to grow in faith and spirituality.

Rachel Roa, Fr. Martin Day, OFMConv and Susie Zagar celebrating FMS’s 20th Anniversary event in October 2010.


My year has been a time for spiritual growth and a strengthening of values I already hold dear: community, faith, living simply, and working for social justice and human dignity. It has been a time of profound discernment and spiritual direction, and a time to discern mission. What I realize is that while I may not necessarily go overseas to travel (though I of course have not ruled it out), I know in my heart that I will always try to live mission in my daily life wherever I am.
Rhegan Hyypio and Susie Zagar at the FMS Annual Staff Retreat in Beach Haven, NJ in June 2011.



I am ever grateful for all the people that I have been able to meet this year; I am thankful for the FMS staff and community who have become a second family to me, for the missioner candidates and missioners serving overseas, for all of those who help to contribute to FMS’s vision with hearts full of love and generosity. I promise I will continue to keep the Franciscan charism alive in my heart in all my life’s journeys to come! Peace and All Good!
Last summer’s “Helping Hands” Painting Project at FMS.

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We prepare and support lay Catholics for two-year international, one-year domestic and 1-2 week short-term mission service opportunities in solidarity with impoverished and marginalized communities across the globe.

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