Where The Heart Is: Patna, India
In the middle of the last century, to become a missionary often meant leaving your family, your friends, everything you had ever known to travel to a place so primitive that centuries old farming techniques were still in use.
To a location so foreign that a local leaf chewing custom is mistaken for a symptom of bleeding tuberculosis.
To a region so remote that amoebic dysentery is contracted upon arrival.
To a society so in need that those deemed “untouchable” become trash pickers and rat eaters.
Most people think to be a missionary means dismissing local custom and religion in order to convert pagans to Christianity. But if you are a Jesuit, it means embracing the unknown and committing your life to the selfless service of others.
This is the experience of Jesuit fathers John Kenealy, Edwin Daly, and Robert Schmidt – Jesuits from the Midwest who, as young priests, became missionaries in Patna, India. Following in the footsteps of those Jesuits who started the Patna mission in 1921, these men traveled to India “to die”. Where the Heart Is captures their amazing stories before that happens.
These men, and hundreds of others, helped build a mission in Patna that over the decades has touched and improved countless lives – lives that were considered expendable. They embraced a new culture and people, only to fall in love with their adopted homes and never leave.
