Called by the General Council of the Congregation we met on the 2d of July 2018 in Chavagnes.
We came from different countries and continents : Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, Cameroon, Canada, Spain and Madagascar to live a month around the theme « BE RENEWED IN YOUR SPIRIT OF YOUR VOCATION ».
With a staff in the hand like pilgrims
We were invited by the General Council to walk to the Grotto of Lourdes where the opening ceremony began at the foot of the Virgin Mary and the icon of her encounter with Elizabeth. Like Mary and Elizabeth, we were invited to live a fruitful meeting among ourselves.
After receiving the necessary pilgrim’s staff, we started off towards the olive tree planted during the bicentennial celebration. Here we enriched the earth around the olive tree with soil from our various mission sites. Thus the soil of our different missions made a covenant with the soil of our mother house the place of our foundation.
Continuing our pilgrimage we used a stone to symbolically deposit our worries and our concerns at the foot of Virgin of the Terrace.
We continued our walk to the door of our meeting room. Here we were each called by name before we entered the room as a sign of our commitment to build our community together.
LThe opening celebration of this month of formation allowed us to enter with faith, joy, openness, courage, trust and abandonment into this pilgrimage.
Using our bodies created in the image of God
This first week introduced us to the theme : "Together on a path of covenant” and had for its objective, "To live an experience of meeting with ourselves, with God and with our sisters, which touches our deepest identity."
Like explorers of new lands we explored our Incarnation through biblical texts of creation, through practical exercises and gestures. These exercises allowed us to rediscover our body, created and modeled in the image of God and to wonder again at his love. This beautiful gift which has been fashioned to receive and give.
Yes, our body is made to move, pray, praise, adore, give thanks, announce and testify, because the Incarnation is a march towards verticality and horizontality. In short, when the Spirit touches us, it touches all that we are. The prayer gestures help us to deepen the mystery of the Incarnation.