The last chapter of the last book of the Old Testament offers a prophetic promise and a challenge that continues to be relevant for our day.
Malachi 3:23 states,

“Lo I will send Elijah the prophet before the day of the Lord comes, that great and terrible day, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of their children to their fathers…”

Tragically, today more than 20 million children live in a home without the physical

presence of a father. We Brothers have always sensed a call from our heavenly

Father and our founder, Fr. Philip Merdinger, to fill the void of fatherlessness among our college students and young adults. If the number of children without natural fathers is massive, imagine the number of young people without spiritual fathers.

Recently, the Brotherhood of Hope completed our 9th Assembly. This is a gathering of all the perpetually professed Brothers, where much like the Apostles in “the Upper Room,” we seek and discern how the Lord is leading us for the next four years.

There were a number of significant visionary initiatives that the Lord has confirmed to us. Perhaps the most important and urgent was a renewed call to be spiritual fathers to the spiritual orphans of our day. The decade’s long trend of men abandoning their role as spiritual and responsible fathers for their families has had a catastrophic impact on the lives of their children. There is a direct connection between the widespread absence of fathers and the historic increase in anxiety and mental health struggles of our young people.

Please pray for us over the next few months as we Brothers discern how we can be better instruments of The Father’s heart for all those we serve.
We hope to reach out to many of you, our alumni and friends, to assist us in this great work of “turning the hearts of fathers to their children and children to their fathers.”



-Br. Kenneth Apuzzo, BH

General Superior
Broterhood of Hope