CONTENTS
​ONE: For the Unity and Life of Humanity
TWO: A NEW HUMANITY THROUGH THE PAROUSIA, AN ESSAY ON MY VISION
THREE: UNTIL YOU COME AGAIN!
FOUR: MY IDENTITY: An Essay on my Identities, Relationships and Roles
INTRODUCTION

 ​            It has seemed appropriate for me to put these several essays together in one format since they really do have a common thread that goes back to my “vision experience” at St. Patrick’s parish church in the town of Mymensingh in April of 1978, when I was living with three other companions in the Bangladesh Unit of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers. I have described this “vision experience” in great detail in the second essay of this collection. These four essays are the first fruits of a long writing project that will touch on several major themes of my long missionary life. All of my writings and more are available on my website: www.johnthepmartin.com or through contact with me by my email address: johnthep@msn.com.
            During my pilgrimage time in India from 1991 to 1994, I continued a practice from my earlier days in Bangladesh to write something in my journal each day. I thus accumulated a huge amount of personal material that lay in those journals in helter-skelter fashion, that is, just as the impressions, feelings, reflections, dreams, thoughts, etc. came to me. I decided that to make this material useful or readable at all, I would have to organize it better. This I did by marking each paragraph of the journals with a key word. Then I created a folder for each key word and called them “themes”, ending up with about 35 of them. I have transcribed a lot of this material into photocopied or digital formats over the years. I also partially implemented another task of cross-referencing entries from one theme to another, as it seemed fit to do so. A few of these will be seen in these essays.
            This is by way of a partial fulfilment of a dream to discover more connections among the various themes which would dilute the impression of fragmentation by keeping them in separate folders. As I write about what I can learn from this process, I could thus arrive at a more integrated vision of myself in my relationships and in my cosmic environment, hopefully for the benefit of my readers, too. An example of this very phenomenon can be found in “An After Word” at the end of the essay “My Identity”.
            I am proud to have seen my life enriched with the company of such a spiritual giant as Father Bede Griffiths, at whose Shantivanam Ashram in South India I stayed on many occasions, and with the spirit imbedded in the writings of such giants as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Sri Aurobindo Ghose.
            These four essays touch on the themes of “My Vision” and “My Identity”.
            Enjoy!

1993
John P. Martin
Note on August 8, 2018:

During my three years in India from 1991 to 1994, living among a  mostly Hindu population in and near Calcutta, I wrote this for a bulletin that was published in India by Father Albert Nambiaparambil for an interfaith conference, in Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, India, about 1993. This is the town at the very southern tip of the South Asian sub-continent and thus a very sacred place for Hindus.
 
            By birth I am son and brother. By culture I am Irish‑American. By faith I am Catholic. By profession I am a missionary with Maryknoll. By role I am a priest.

            In the pilgrimage of my adult life, I have experienced the challenges and the fruits of assimilation of the cultural and religious traditions of Catholic Mexico, Muslim Bangladesh and Hindu India, having spent 20 years overseas in thus answering the call of God in my heart. I have lived with and ministered to the Mexican people in my priestly role. I have tried to be brother and friend among my Muslim brothers and sisters in Bangladesh. I am presently sojourning in India in response to the call of the Spirit Within to taste the fruits of adaptation to the Hindu culture of the Bengali people.

x.