Dearest Magdala Family,

“After the storm comes the calm, after winter comes summer, and after the night comes the day.” With these words, The Imitation of Christ invites us to Christian hope, to patience, and to enduring the trials that sometimes come into our lives. Sooner or later, suffering will pass.

With this note of Christian realism, we joyfully welcome the approach of true peace in the Holy Land. On October 7th, the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary—and the second anniversary of the outbreak of this conflict—we received the hopeful news of a new spiral of peace. Blessed be God! Truly, our hearts are filled, and we can finally breathe deeply after two years of witnessing the immense waste of resources, time, energy, and lives caused by this conflict between Hamas and Israel. Our capacity to endure has been tested to the extreme, and it is only by God’s grace, through your prayers and generosity, that we have reached this moment safe and sound. We ask the Lord, the “Prince of Peace,” to make His loving, merciful, and gracious presence known among us.

We express our deep gratitude for the tireless efforts of Pope Francis and Patriarch Pierbattista in seeking peace and justice for all peoples. Let us continue, during this month of the Rosary, to remain steadfast in prayer and trust. May the Virgin Mary, Mother of all, weave bonds of true humanity among us at this moment in history. And with that, our thoughts turn to the return of our beloved pilgrims.

May the day soon come when we joyfully walk again with many of you through the streets, villages, and hills of the Holy Land. “If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my tongue cleave to my palate.” On that note, I want to express heartfelt gratitude to so many of you—for your words, your gestures, your generosity, and your constant prayers that have kept us standing strong. For this reason, I am pleased to share that the months of September and October have been a time of deep preparation to resume our pilgrimages.

On another note, we have signed the contracts to complete the remaining elements of Magdala’s original project: the final restaurant, the residence for the priestly community serving here, and the permanent pergola for the synagogue. These works had begun on October 5, 2023, and now, two years later, we take them up again with renewed hope and determination—this time with the desire not to stop until they are finished. We humbly ask for your support and generosity, if you feel called, to help bring these projects to completion. Much of the capital originally intended for these works was used to sustain us through these two years of war. With your help and God’s providence, we trust that we can complete them next year, continuing to make Magdala a place of encounter, faith, and hope for all.

Looking ahead, we are also renewing our travel agency, New Gate Tours, based in Mexico. A new director has been appointed, new staff have joined, and new pilgrimage itineraries are being designed with the goal of relaunching the agency alongside the return of pilgrims to the Holy Land. We ask for your confidence and prayers as we aim to reach new goals and offer even better service to our beloved pilgrims.

With heartfelt gratitude, let us thank the Lord for the gift of peace.

With fraternal affection,

Fr. Juan María Solana, L.C. and the Magdala Team

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