Chapter Vicarial 2009

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Surely all that you have lived here is a gift of the Spirit to the Vicariate and to the Family at this time when you celebrate 150 years of Holy Family Contemplative life!

...
As you return to your communities may you be bearers of the good news and with love and hope prepare the sisters to welcome the decisions. It is all the members, together with the leadership team, who assume responsibility to promote and live these decisions. In this, as in all situations of life, you are invited to open yourselves evermore fully to God and to others, to give and to receive. (Art 223) May the Holy Family accompany you on your journey and help you to “go forward” with joy and love.
Margaret Muldoon (Sup. Gen)

2009-01-23T16:06:00.002+01:00

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So, since the election of the new Vicariate Council has already taken place the Chapter is drawing to a close earlier than anticipated.

This afternoon we will meet in the hall at 4:00pm to approve the final text which will help us during the next five years. After that and a short break the chapter will be declared closed after Margaret has spoken, the acts of the chapter have been signed and the closing celebration is over.

But everything does not end here. Tomorrow morning at 11:30 the Superior General of the Oblates will come to celebrate the Eucharist in thanksgiving for the 150th anniversary of the Foundation of the contemplative vocation in the Holy Family.

We know that you will be present with us and that many will be the times when we shall meet again on the journey which began here during these days, - that is what our family is about! Thank you all for everything.

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The members of the new council are:

Bernadette Taurinya (Vicaria)

Mª Dolores Sanzberro. Nacida en 1942. España

Lorenza Ponnanwila. Nacida en 1946. Sri-Lanka

Françoise Daigneault. Nacida en 1931. Canadá

2009-01-23T10:47:00.007+01:00

Good morning!

The day began with some sad news : the death of a Contemplative sister:
Sister Marguerite Marie Le Coq (Martillac. France)

After a few words of introduction reminding us that today we must look beyond ourselves, our own interests and preferences, we spent some time in prayer repeating many times over the invocation to the Holy Spirit.

The final prayer:

God, our Father,
when we realise how much you love us,
something in our life becomes calm and we are transformed.
In Jesus, your well-beloved Son, our Peace and our Joy,
You bless us and call us to CHOOSE LIFE.
In your goodness, grant our prayer today so that,
through Him and in Him,
attentive to your Spirit,
in all our decisions and all our choices,
we may be a hymn of praise to your Glory.
We ask this through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen.

After the prayer there followed the period of listening that we mentioned yesterday. The sisters expressed themselves in depth and sincerity. We then moved on to the next step: the indicative vote.

Malini and Malena handed a voting paper to each capitulant on which she was asked to write three names. From these a new list will be drawn up according to the number of votes each sister had received.

At 10:30 the sisters will be able go back to the hall to pick up this new list. From this time until 11:30 Margaret and the facilitator will be available to any sister who wishes to communicate the reasons why she would like her name to be taken off the list .

At 11:45 we will return to the chapter hall where we will find the definitive list and we will proceed with the election proper according to the Constitutions of the Institute:
the required majority, number of votes etc. (Art. Const. 230)

Oteiza (España)

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On returning to the chapter hall each sister went to put in the appointed place the paper on which she had written the five names requested. From these names a list will be drawn up and will be made available to the capitulants in the chapter hall from 6:30pm.

To end the day the community of Oteiza(Spain) will present itself to the assembly.

Tomorrow we begin the Assembly at 9:00am so that those who wish may express themselves (reservations, difficulties etc) It will be a time of listening.

If a sister who is on the list is not present, she will be contacted and asked if she would like to say anything to the Assembly before the capitulants move to the final vote.
Any information received will be communicated to the Assembly.

The atmosphere is one of respectful silence.

2009-01-22T17:54:00.006+01:00

We can say that the after noon was divided into two parts :

The first part consisted of taking another look at the final document: clarifications, observations, and it was decided by an absolute majority that this document will be called a Recommendation and the new Council will explain in a post-capitular letter exactly what is meant by that term, so that we all understand the same thing.

We began the election process for the Vicariate Council. First of all we read the
process to be followed and time was given for any clarifications required.

Bernadette informed the capitulants of the results of the consultation of the sisters concerning the number of councillors to be elected.
The Constitutions specify 4, but in the consultation 3 were proposed. An indult had been requested and the request was granted.
The econome is one of the Councillors and is elected by the Council once it has been elected.
The sisters were told that of the 50 sisters in the Vicariate, three have the right to Vote but are not eligible themselves not having the required number of years after final profession.
After this the process of election was voted on. It was accepted with an absolute majority.

Time was left for personal reflection so that on their return to the chapter hall they could proceed with the straw vote. Maria Carmen invited the sisters to recall the challenges facing the Vicariate and to consider of the names of 5 sisters they consider capable of rising to these challenges and see them through to the end.

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We have taken the first step in the elaboration of our text and now the Drafting Committee will have to take it up again and improve it by including the suggestions that we made during our sharing.

When we had finished the facilitator asked us to take a moment of silence asking ourselves how we feel after having done what we could to improve the text. We expressed ourselves freely in one word:

Joy
Trust
Daring
Hope Gratitude
Zeal
Amazement
Magnificat
Happiness
Strengthened
Abandonment
Serenity
Go forward
Identity

We will meet again in the chapter hall at 3:00.

2009-01-22T10:52:00.003+01:00

“This morning the Word of God spoke to us of a new Covenant, of new promises…”, said Maria Carmen Vilardell (facilitator) after welcoming us.

She gave us a short summary of what has happened since January 13th and helped us to realise that we are being continually linked up with the all embracing reality of the new vision which arose out of the General Chapter.

With the help of a song the Assembly asked Mary to accompany us in this new stage of our journey. After this the drafting committee presented the first draft of the conclusions that we have reached up till now. Time was given for a first reading of the draft after which we were invited to ask for any clarifications that we needed. We then went into our linguistic groups to:
- share our reactions to the text
- add points or remove them if necessary.

We return to the hall at 11:00am.

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We concluded the journey we had made with Colleen during these last two days
with a celebration. This took the form of a sharing of the statements and meditations that had been given to us previously and giving thanks for what we had lived together.

These two days have been very intense. Now a special time for the Vicariat is fast approaching with the election of the new Council.

We celebrated the Eucharist at 6:15 and gave thanks for today.

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We came back together in the hall at 3:00pm and shared our dreams. We include here some pictures and words which will give you some idea of these dreams. Between each group’s presentation we sang the chorus of an English song which said “I have a dream….which helps me to face whatever happens…all I know is that it is the right moment for me and I can cross to the other side of the stream”.

After this Colleen gave us some thoughts (printed) inviting us to discover the ones which touched us most and in which God is calling us to live something new.

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Congratulations, Clare, on the ocasion of your birthday!

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Now it’s time to start dreaming! This is what Colleen said to us when she began the session. But what do we have to dream about?

Margaret told us the story (a true story) of a Carmelite Monastery where the sisters, somewhat worried about the age gaps in their community (beween 90 and 50 years), were asking themselves seriously what they would have to offer to a thirty year-old woman if she were to present herself one day. They spent a lot of time discussing this. When they realised that they were ready to receive new members, they began a serious vocation campaign and various women between 30-40 presented themselves and began their formation. This convent is now flourishing. A dream must give a real impulse, must motivate people and get them moving (and Colleen k is really good at this!)

This will show us a way of dreaming that is both simple and objective at the same time:
Our dream must not come from to our desire to survive at all costs, but rather from the conviction that the world needs what we alone have to offer.

We must dream of a new way of being gift to the world by allowing our Corporate Commitment to light up the way.

She insisted that we try to forget the words that we use all the time, words that are worn out , and gave us the following task:In the light of our Corporate Commitment create a dream about how our Holy Family Contemplative life can be a light for the world within five years.

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We came back to the hall for a period of sharing. As Colleen had told us to we tried to draw and cut out something in the shape of a balloon in which we wrote the fruits of our reflection. (You will be able to see these in the photos).

This was followed by a time of silence during which we were invited to ask ourselves: how do we feel when we see what we are already living of our Corporate commitment? The sharing which followed was rich, deep, sincere and full of joy. After a well deserved break we came back to the hall and took up the Corporate Commitment once more to see what the new vision adds to what we are already living.

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Colleen Moore. sfb

We began the day with the song « God of Everything », and we had not been in the hall five minutes when Colleen put us into groups and presented us with a new challenge: to assess and appreciate the way we are already living the Corporate commitment, recalling what we have been living up to now.

We formed these group voluntarily according to the following themes:
- The Word of God
- The vows
- The Family
- The quality of our relationships
- Passion for the Kingdom

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Martillac (Francia)

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WEB. Sisters Contemplatives Holy Family of Bordeaux

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Mª Carmen Vilardell. sfb

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“In God we live and move and have our being”.

After meeting in the hall we go to our linguistic groups to share what has been the strongest invitation each one has felt and will be a help for us to live the priorities chosen for the next five years. Colleen introduced the sharing by quoting the second paragraph of our Corporate commitment: “To choose life today calls us to an awareness of a new world view…”

She underlined the invitation to adopt a new style of relationships and questioned us on what it is that is an obstacle to this.

She opened an interesting dialogue: after becoming aware of one’s own qualities, capacities and gifts to share freely how we relate to people, to all created things. What gifts have I received? The sharing is very rich springing straight from the heart. At this point Colleen asks us to share our image of God to help us to broaden our vision.

We didn’t even have a rest whilst having our cup of tea! We were asked to seek out someone that we did not often have occasion to speak to and share our different gifts.

When we returned to the hall, Colleen challenged us with some questions. Considering the gifts that you have:
how are you going to go forward with you priorities as a Vicariat,
our vision as an Institute,
and our life as a Family at the service of Jesus’ mission in the world?

This was the work to be done as personal reflection from now until Vespers. We ended our session with the Song “Ancient Love”.

This evening after supper Martillac,(France) will present its Community.

We’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.

Martillac (Francia)

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Malini Joseph and Jeevamalar Philip

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The morning was very powerful. The facilitator began by welcoming everyone back after the free day yesterday and handed over the microphone to Bernadette who thanked Colleen for her presence with us and for the reflection that she would be leading during the next two days on the theme :”Our life hidden with Christ in God at the heart of the cosmos”

Colleen began with a power point presentation which included the song: “ Ancient love”
….She was there as Ancient love..”

She encouraged us to prepare ourselves to welcome this new cosmic vision which emerged
during the General Chapter and demands of us the detachment necessary to allow something new to be born. “We are the earth’s conscience” and we must listen as earth’s community. This option leads us to live “God Alone” who lives in every life cycle, in everything that is.

Immediately after this Colleen, with the help of a cosmic clock, compressed the 15 billion years since the beginning life into 365 days and explained what happened in each moment (comparatively speaking) right up to today. So, in this time scale, we can say that in the space of the last 5 seconds Jesus came on earth.

There was a short time for comments from the floor about what was awakening in each one’s heart, how we are going to welcome this life, this resurrection. This encouraged us not to close ourselves up in our limited human mentality.

Little by little we, the human race, are waking up to this invitation to “love one another “.

Then came a time for us to share feelings linking up what had been expressed up to now with everything that we have been living during the chapter. “Let’s be enthusiastic!!”. Another deep question arose. What resurrection energy is there in me now? Resurrection means joy and hope.

There is a call to be conscious of the presence of God in everything. To live out of that part of creation which we form.

We had a break and on coming back Colleen surprised us with some posters depicting the old and the new vision of cosmology. We spent some time on these looking closely at them and commenting on them as though we were in an art gallery.

To end the morning and before the hour of personal reflection that had been planned, we looked at a document entitled “The Awakening Universe.”. This document stated that to tell the history of something is to tell the history of everything. After listening to this document we went off to reflect.

We’ll come back at 3:00pm.

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Mª Carmen Leach, Shanti Simon, Depa Fernando y Monica Perera

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Even though today was free, after supper we came together for the presentation of the monastery of Posadas (Argentina) .
Before beginning the presentation Marie Carmen Leach, who is the secretary of the Postulator for the Founder’s Cause, encouraged us to do all we can to pray to the Founder, make him known and encourage people to have confidence in him. After this the Posadas sisters gave their presentation rejoicing in the fact that they have been present in Posadas for 15 years. We’ll leave you with some photos of the meeting.

Posadas (Argentina)

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See you on Tuesday!!!

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The afternoon was very full. Each group presented its proposals and points of view in order to reach the desired objective which had been named earlier in the chapter, and was to be worked on for the next five years.
Those who wished to comment on how they saw these proposals were given time to do so.

Today the Drafting Committee (Catherine Pilenthiran, Clare Fernando, Francoise Daigneault and Malena Sanchez) will have to work hard to express these priorities clearly: formation, the elderly and sick sisters and the process to be followed in order to achieve the proposed objective.

Lourdes Fernandez reminded the group of some of Margaret’s words in her Opening Address to the Vicarial Chapter and to the General Chapter insisting on the calls addressed to us, the attitudes we are invited to live and the prejudices to be rejected.

Tomorrow we have a free day. Some of us will rest at home and others will visit the city.

2009-01-18T16:27:00.002+01:00

Here we are gathering the fruits of our labours saying like Samuel: » Speak Lord, your servant is listening.”

The facilitator gave us some information:
Tomorrow we will be free all day and in the evening the sisters of Posadas (Argentina) will present their community to the assembly and to the sisters of the community.

After a hymn we began sharing the work that we had done in our groups yesterday to discover the three priorities that seem to express most adequately the objective chosen for the next 5 years and which will be given to the new council for them to implement.

The sharing was good, realistic, and deep and there were many convergences. Lourdes Fernandez encouraged the sisters to chat together in twos on the spot and comment on what had been said up till now by the different groups. Priorities became apparent including“the priority of priorities”( which will be dealt with on the last day of the chapter). We had to cut the assembly short in order to go to Mass ( so many people come to our house for Mass!). When Mass was over we continued the work in linguistic groups deciding on priorities, (each group was to choose just one) thus formulating a proposal which included how this would be realised , who would assume responsibility for it, when it would be put into practice and the length of time to be foreseen for its experimentation before evaluating it.

We will come together again at 15:30. See you later!

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Looking for convergences, and finishing off the work that we have been doing up to now, we began a listening session. Each monastery presented its way of seeing its own reality as it is today and as it will be in 5 years time. A period of silence followed to allow people to recall what had been shared and this was followed by interventions from the assembly expressing what people were feeling, questions, clarifications and observations. In general the same fragilities and weaknesses could be detected even though the realities are different and give rise to a variety of feelings.
Lourdes Fernandez encouraged them not be discouraged by thoughts of death and to go beyond the limits of the Monastery to reclaim the signs of life that were present in the whole of the sharing. Discovering these will help us to work for the good things we have and help us to discover them.

“The people who walked in darkness has seen a great light” (Isaias 9:1)

After a short time of relaxation we went back into our linguistic groups until supper time. Our task was to find three urgent priorities for the Vicariat that the next Council will deal with. Tomorrow we will put them in common, come to a consensus regarding them and see how to bring them about, when ….

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Martine Pottelet and Puvana Thuraisamy

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Eithne Hughes: A woman who is attentive to details big and small!

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What was said this morning in symbolic ways:

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After some announcements, we began our prayer creating a “psalm” together, each ona sharing briefly how she was as the day began.

Before you Lord:

Come and walk with us!!

We have a listening session to clarify what we mean by the “ common good of the Vicariat”, a point on which we spent some time in personal reflection yesterday. Each one expresses herself simply:” For me the common good of the Vicariat means…

What does this morning’s work consist of?

A long time of personal reflection.
A meeting for the members of each monastery represented here.

To do what?

To look at ourselves and all that we have lived until now ( statistics, information about the communities, sisters in formation…)
Faced with this objective reality what do we observe objectively from this information and what we have lived up to now?Draw up a profile of our communities as they will be in five years time: what our needs will be, the people on whom we will be able to count. This must be done in a way that is foreseeable and clear.

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The spring from which water flows to quench the thirst of the desert

Chapter Secretary

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Lourdes de la Fuente. sfb

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After a quiet session of « active listening » Lourdes Fernandez suggested that we take an hour for personal reflection in which she invited us to allow the needs and consequences that occur to us as a result of this morning’s work. This would be followed by work in the linguistic groups to gather up the fruits of the seeds sown during the whole day.

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What seeds are we sowing in the earth?

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After a greeting and a prayer to the Holy Spirit, Maria Dolores Sanzberro (Contemplative sister) presented Lourdes Fernandez Loeches ss.cc. who has come from Spain to help us during the next three days in our reflections on the theme: “ Choose life in the present reality of our Communities”

Lourdes Fernandez began by making an appeal for the group to really live the opportunities that are on offer, as was recommended in the first reading of
today’s Eucharisitic liturgy; and to be aware of what the paralytic and the people who took him to Jesus had to do.(Gospel) She took Margeret’s letter, sent in 2007, and used by the Council of the Vicariat in January 2008 and spent quite some time on it so that we remember to what extent we are involved in this process of change and what has been our involvement in it up till now.

Through the information received and the work done up till now, Lourdes had become aware of some resistances, hesitations, fears. She invited us to let go of them and encouraged us to put fear aside and be available and well disposed to get down to work now and leave the future in the hands of the Lord; to get rid of any barrier between the “my” and the “our” and to feel that we are in the Church for the world. “ We must join together now ,“ each one with her own personal gift in order to grasp the will of God for today. We must look to the common good.

The important thing is how we are, where we are and who is leading our life. We must be aware of this so that the communion that embraces the whole human family and indeed all created reality may be made possible. To choose life is to open ourselves to a new consciousness and a new vision of the world. It urges us to a change of mentality (is it true or is it just a dream ?), to live and go on giving life to the very end like truly fruitful women, not just as the Vicariat, but as the whole body.

We are being called in many directions and we must not let get lost in the midst of them. We must name our fears in order to become truly authentic and live what Pierre Bienvenu Noailles dreamed for us: to be bonds of communion in the mystical heart of the Holy Family.

Let us all go forward together feeling that we are on the way.

After this input there was time for personal reflection and after 15 minutes we came back to the hall to be given the guidelines for work to be done.
We learned that we would have an hour of personal reflection followed by work in linguistic groups. To do what? To look, to enlighten each other and to commit ourselves so that we look at everything we have seen and heard as a type of “spiritual reading” and
become aware of our real situation and thus be able to look at what we will be in 5 year’s time.

If we have to die, let us die with joy.
Let us live and die

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Mónica Alexander and Gertie Peiris

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Sharing of questions and challenges :

The four communities live the same reality and the 4 themes (Liturgy of the hours, Eucharist and adoration, the spiritual combat, justice and peace and integrity of creation) have been enlightening and have shown the unity of our life in Christ. In Him our life is unified, lit up from within so that each one becomes praise of the Father constantly tuned into the Spirit. The Eucharist and the Word of God are the food and strength of our daily life.

Everything is a gift of God and must be shared. Everything has its beginning in the seed of the very first moment. Everything is interconnected in the work of God. There is unity and complementarity. We must live the whole reality from the centre and vice versa.

Calls to:
-live the paschal dimension of our lives;
-live in an attitude of permanent discernement;
- persevere in continual prayer;
- live at greater depth and truth to ensure the quality of the
life we offer to the Lord each day in silence and solitude,
in continual prayer and in our work.
-link up with the source of everything which is present in
the work of creation.
-live quality relationships.
stay awake in our mission of praise and adoration; know
how to wonder.
- respect creation
- live in solidarity with the poor and with those who suffer;
- fight against individualism and egoism;
- live the spirit of God Alone in everything;

The spiritual combat, the combat of our whole life…

- Give God the first place in our life. That is the spiritual
combat that must be lived day after day according to the
demands of the spirit of God Alone.
- To come out of oneself so that God can dwell in us. To let
ourselves be taken over by Him, that is joyful penance.
To be present ourselves in the place we give to God.

The call to hope...

- God is also the author of our hope qui takes in both charity and faith. He hopes more than we do and our
hope is our response to his, and his hope is always new,
young and active.

The call to responsibility:

- Living our vocation faithfully means living what we are called to live in the Church, in the Family and in the world.

Words which were often repeated:

CHRIST THE CENTRE OF OUR LIFE – UNITY – COMMUNION – UNIFICATION – RELATIONSHIPS – QUALITY OF RELATIONSHIPS – DEPTH IN THE QUALITY OF OUR RELATIONSHIPS – INTERDEPENDENCE – SILENCE AND SOLITUDE – SOLIDARITY WITH THE POOR – THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD – THE COSMIC VISION WHCH IS BEING DEPLOYED – THE CREATIVE SPIRIT.

Translators

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Kathleen Elsander

Mary Slaven. sfb

Teresa Cabo. sfb

Paschal Irigoyen. sfb

Blog translators

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A special space for the blog translators:

Spanish to French: Marie Madelene Fedrigo. sfb

Spanish to English: Mary Slaven. sfb

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Conchita Cosgaya and Carmen Leach

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The afternoon began with the presentation of the following themes:
Martillac(France) “The spiritual combat and continual prayer”

and Nagoda (Sri Lanka) "Justice and peace and the integrity of creation”.

Time was given for personal reflection after which the sisters were invited to return to the hall for clarification and to open up a dialogue…

After this there is a session in an atmosphere of quiet and music during which the sisters will share on “As a contemplative Sister of the Holy Family of Bordeaux what question arises in me”?

We will give you more details later.

We will finish the day together with Vespers.

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Maria Carmen Vilardell (moderator) reminded us that in the Eucharist the Lord invites us to listen, saying :”Don’t harden your heart”, and invites us to be open to whatever we hear with our hearts. Not to let our attitude be that of someone who is just receiving a piece of information.

The Steering Committee has judged it necessary to modify the programme envisaged for today and so in addition to the Financial Report the content of January 19th will be transferred to today.

Bernadette began by presenting the Financial Report that had been prepared by the out-going Council and said that sometimes the statistics presented mention November 2008 and not only December 2007. They thought this necessary because of the present world economic situation.

During the morning such words expenses, fixed assets, liquid assets, capital, circulation of goods could be heard in the room.

Our goods are the goods of the Institute. They are entrusted to us to manage for the Vicariat and are at the service of communion.

Hospitality, needlework, the making of hosts and pensions are the principal sources of income in our monasteries, but our young sisters are encouraged to prepare themselves to take up some work which can assure us of income, and help us to live the contemplative life to which we are calle.

Article 26 of the Constitutions: “Material goods are gifts from God destined for all. We accept them gratefully, use then moderately and simply, and are careful to share then”.

A frugal lifestyle means living the ethic of just enough. The important thing, said Bernadette, is to discern our needs (personal, as a Vicariat and as an Institute). In our way of life having too much as just as bad as having too little.

“All our works support one another. ” (PBN) This is our reality. Mutual support and pooling refer not only to economics, but rather to the quality of our lives, our welcome, the gift of ourselves…

“Good management leads to solidarity” Benedict XVI.

Time was then give for clarifications, questions and comements.

At 11:20 the Communities of Oteiza Posadas were invited to present their reflexions on how they were beginning to live the orientations from the last General Chapter regarding :
Posadas (Argentina ) “The Eucharist and adoration”
Oteiza (Spain) “The Liturgy of the Hours”.

After this there was a period of personal reflection on the texts on which the presentations were based.

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“I offer my good wishes to the Contemplative Sisters of the Holy Family of Bordeaux”
(Benedict XVI 14th January 2009.)

As a Chapter we arrived for the Holy Father’s audience on Wednesday 14th January. In the name of all of us Sr.Bernadette assured him of our daily prayer for all«his intentions. In answer to the Holy Father’s question Sr.Bernadette told him that we had come from France but also from Sri Lanka, Argentina, and Spain. She asked him for his blessing for everyone, especially for our sick sisters. The Holy Father replied: “You have my blessing.”

Information Service

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Maristella Soosaipillai .sfb and Maribel Cortés .sfb

Presentation Nagoda (Sri Lanka)

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2009-01-14T21:58:00.001+01:00

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M. Carmen Vilardell (moderator) animates the group as we take un the report of the Vicariate. She reminds us that we need to see it in the light off the orientations of the General Chapter. We have taken off some time ago – now it is this time to came down to earth. By means of a Power Point presentation, the vicar presents the life of the Vicariate from 2002-2008. We will let some pictures.

After the power point presentation the capitulants were asked to spend some time alone reflecting on the information they had just received concerning the Vicariat: what were their reactions to what they had seen and heard? what questions did this information raise for them? did it awaken any desires in them? This evening, after supper, the Nagoda community (Sri Lanka) will have the opportunity to present themselves informally to the assembly. We'll tell you about it tomorrow.

2009-01-14T16:10:00.001+01:00

2009-01-14T16:02:00.002+01:00

At 8 :30 we were all ready to face the traffic and the usual Vatican “red tape” in order to gain entrance to the Paul VI Audience Hall. We were only two hours early!!! Benedict XVI began his audience with a text from St. Paul to the Colossians which speaks of Christ as the head of the of the Church, and he added “and of the cosmos”, even though the text had already mentioned creation. And he knew nothing about the theme of our Chapter!!

After reading his talk in various languages, the different spokespersons called out the names of the groups who were present, according to the different languages represented. The Vicarial Chapter of the Contemplative Sisters of the Holy Family of Bordeaux was mentioned twice! After this the Pope imparted his apostolic blessing.

At the end of the audience, the Holy Father came down to the people and Bernadette Taurinya (Vicar of the Contemplative sisters) was able to speak to him.

What does the afternoon hold for us? We’ll soon see.

2009-01-14T14:03:00.005+01:00

(Malini Joseph -India- and Malena Sáchez -Paraguay-)

This afternoon was quite different from this morning. We dealt with serious and practical matters to ensure the smooth running of the chapter, The main focus was the Chapter Directory, The facilitator reminded the assembly of the purpose of this document and its contents: the rights of the capitulants and the organisation of the chapter.

The steering committee was elected: (Maria Dolores Sanzberro, Teresa McElhone, and Lorenza Ponnanwila) and the two youngest capitulants (Malini Joseph and Malena Sánchez), were named as scrutineers for when any voting takes place,

At 6:30 the Contemplative sisters prayed vespers in the Chapel, and so ended the day.

Tomorrow we will spend the morning in the Vatican because we are going to the papal audience,

The story continues…

2009-01-13T18:01:00.002+01:00

As we said yesterday we met at Mass this morning at 7:30. The Gospel of St. Mark invited us to ask ourselves the question “What do you want of us Jesus of Nazareth?” which is in fact the aim of this Chapter.

At 8:30 we gathered in the chapter hall. Maria Carmen Vilardell (the moderator) invited Teresa McElhone to explain the procedure for the Opening Celebration.

We were welcomed into the hall by a dry desert, which after the celebration had been transformed into a beautiful garden full of flowers to which were added all types of birds, plants and water to quench our thirst. The whole atmosphere had been transformed and there was the smell of incense.

The celebration opened with a procession to the desert where the Word of God, the Constitutions, the Paschal candle, four ribbons of four differents colours representing the four communities and whatever each community had brought to transform the desert into a garden were presented. Standing in front of the desert certain questions were asked: What is the desert? What does it remind us of? Reference was made to the prophet Isaiah (see the attached celebration). Maria Dolores Sanzberro read the preface to the Contemplative Particular Rules and thus began the transformation of the symbol which will accompany us until the 25th: the desert.

Bernadette ended the Celebration with this prayer:

“God, our loving Father, as we begin our Vicariate Chapter, we ask you to open us to a new vision for the future.
Enlighten, guide and direct us where you want us to go. Give us a listening heart and a discerning spirit so that we can choose life for ourselves and for our world. In all that we do may our common mission inspire us. Together we desire to bring life, promote life, share life, care for life, preserve life, and protect life. In fidelity to our specific vocation in the Holy Family, and with the other members of our Family, we want to offer this life to all our brothers and sisters, to the whole of creation and to the reality around us. Make us agents of life, of love, of justice and peace, integrity and freedom through our life hidden with Christ in God at the heart of the cosmos.

May Jesus, Mary and Joseph journey with us during these days, and always. Amen”

Then Margaret was then invited to address the capitulants. Very simply she went through the different stories that are part of our lives: the story of the universe and of the earth, our Christian story and our Family story. She helped us to become aware of the extent to which these stories are interrelated. She stressed in a special way that this year marks the 150th year since the foundation of the Contemplative vocation in the Holy Family and gave a brief account of its history recalling how the Founder considered this foundation as the culmination of his work. She invited us to remain open, to abandon our personal desires so as to listen to what God desires of us. “Allowing God to challenge us means listening to the signs of the times” writes Albert NOLAN.

Sensitive to the atmosphere of silence and recollection, the facilitator invited the assembly spend the next hour entering deeply into Margaret’s words and contemplating their content. After a well deserved break the assembly was invited to return to the hall to share what they had experienced and how they had been challenged by what they had heard.

The next assembly would be at 15:30. See you later…!

2009-01-13T14:52:00.000+01:00

2009-01-13T08:25:00.000+01:00

This afternoon was quite different from this morning. We dealt with serious and practical matters to ensure the smooth running of the chapter, The main focus was the Chapter Directory, The facilitator reminded the assembly of the purpose of this document and its contents: the rights of the capitulants and the organisation of the chapter.

The steering committee was elected: (Maria Dolores Sanzberro, Teresa McElhone, and Lorenza Ponnanwila) and the two youngest capitulants (Malini Joseph and Malena Diaz), were named as scrutineers for when any voting takes place,

At 6:30 the Contemplative sisters prayed vespers in the Chapel, and so ended the day.

Tomorrow we will spend the morning in the Vatican because we are going to the papal audience,

The story continues…

(Maleni Joseph and Malena Díaz)

2009-01-12T22:24:00.001+01:00

At 8:00 we assembled in the Chapter Hall. It was not yet time for the official opening of the Chapter and the four sisters from Spain still had not arrived, but proceedings began with a few words from Bernadette thanking all those who had made the chapter possible:

the team who had prepared it
the translators
the secretariat
the moderator
the information team
and Margaret who presented Marie Carmen VILARDELL to the assembly as chapter moderator: she was accepted by the whole chapter.

Eithne and Puvana then shared a few practical points including how to use the translation equipment.

As we left the Chapter Hall the 4 Spanish sisters had just arrived. They had been held up en route because of bad weather.

Tomorrow we will meet at 7:30 for the celebration of the Eucharist.

Planning

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Chapter's members

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WHAT IS A VICARIATE CHAPTER?

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