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You are here:Home / Family News / NEF 2017 / Family News - March 14th, 2017 / Life of the Congregation
Mar 15, 2017

Life of the Congregation

Preparatory Commission

Life of the Congregation

One month or so before the beginning of the General Chapter, Fr. Enrico Frigerio scj, Vicar General and the Member of the Preparatory Commission of the General Chapter, makes a point on the path that leads us to lake Ypacarai (Paraguay) where takes place the General Chapter, and indicates in large lines the contents which have emerged from the Regional Chapters and which will be submitted to the General Chapter.

Statute No. 9 of our Rule of Life says: At least one year before the meeting of the General Chapter, the Superior General communicates the subjects to be dealt with to all the religious. He invites them to make known their suggestions to the regional chapters, which presents their proposals to him. Each religious can also answer directly to the superior general.

The Council of the Congregation of the last year (February 2016) focused on this statute. The Regional Superiors and the General Council had prepared the charts of reflection accompanied with the questionnaires which were meant to support the exchanges during the Regional Chapters of the three Regions. At the end of their joint work, the members of the Council of the Congregation and the superior general had essentially identified three main themes : the rediscovery of our Betharramite vocation ; the community in mission ; the identification of our Betharramite mission. These three themes and the corresponding questionnaires were the fruit of personal reflection, confrontation and group work within the Council of the Congregation. The superior general had then transmitted this material to the regional superiors and had appointed them, together with the General Councillors, members of the Preparatory Commission for the General Chapter, and invited them to return to the Council of the Congregation with the proposals of the various Regional Chapters. Such was the starting point for the work of the Commission, gathered in Rome at the General House from 6 to 12 February 2017, the last Council of the Congregation of the present administration.

Framed by the ‘narratio’ in the morning and by the Eucharistic celebration in the evening, these days of intense work, benefited in a true fraternal climate and were characterized by a frank and loyal confrontation on the contents of the reports of the three Regional Superiors, carrying on the Areas of shadow and light of their respective communities and vicariates.
After a brief “evaluation” of his Region since the 2011 General Chapter of Bethlehem, each Regional Superior presented the state of spiritual health of the religious, in indicating the initiatives taken at various levels for permanent formation, and which opened the paths of rediscovery of their own vocation and the Betharramite identity.

Another treated theme is the vocational animation. It must be noted that the richness of vocations in the “South” corresponds to an almost total absence of vocations in vicariates linked to the origins of our Congregation. This note has led to a reflection and an evaluation of the “international communities” (willed also by the 2011 Chapter) with which we try to introduce a new sap and renewed enthusiasm in the communities of “old” Europe by the insertion of the young religious priests.

An important theme during this Council of the Congregation was highlighted by the choice of the icon for the General Chapter, namely the meeting between Mary and Elizabeth, with the corresponding devise: Running to embrace life’s call”. We are called to put ourselves forward with joy, without delay, towards the “peripheries” of the today’s world. “More than a determined ministry, the mission of Betharram appears itself to a” way of doing “marked by the spirit of obedience: it is that which makes us free, detached, available, capable of abandoning what occupies us, as gifted as we are, to “go out” on the spot, where the superiors call us. (Editorial of Fr. Gaspar, “NEF”, March 2016). This “go out” should not scatter us, but should create even deeper bonds of communion: As consecrated persons, even if mission disperses us in the world, our own way of being consists in “walking together”. This requires listening to one another, in our fraternal community, in the vicariate assemblies, in regional and general chapters, in councils (Editorial of Fr. Gaspar, “NEF”, March 2016). This style of mission requires communities in which one practices a true listening, by which we can “communicate what is essential for us”, and this has opened up another very current theme, that of communication.

The regional chapters submitted to the Commission the proposals concerning the laity, which, with an intensity which varies from one region to another, more and more associate themselves as partners in the mission of Betharram. Religious sent equally their personal contributions which the Commission had read and shared in a meeting and that the Superior General added to the list of subjects which will be submitted to the attention of the General Chapter.

At the end of the meeting, our regard turned on the future, which is already there, in part, before us: our Betharramite community in Vietnam, which for the moment canonically depends on the General Council. Father Gaspar and Father Graziano presented this reality after a recent visit to the two confreres who opened a new road for Betharram in the Far East. A whole day was devoted to the presentation of accounts by the Bursar General, seconded by Mme Maria Grazia and Mr Luigi Pirovano.

To conclude, I would like to remind you that most of the informations concerning the situation of the three Regions are available in the supplements of the NEF published in November 2016 (Father Auguste Etchecopar Region), January 2017 (St. Mary of the Jesus Crucified Region) and February 2017 (St Michel Garicoïts Region), on the official website of our Congregation (www.betharram.net).

Enrico Frigerio scj
Vicar General

 

The Icon of the XXVII General Chapter

In our 27th General Chapter we would like to make a discernment on the situation of our congregation called to better respond to this “Church going forth”, wanted by Pope Francis.
Therefore we would like to begin by contemplating Mary, the first disciple, in the icon of the Visitation. Mary is running with eagerness to serve and to bring Jesus, hidden in her womb, to her cousin Elizabeth, who also is pregnant, despite her old age.
Mary could have closed in on herself savoring the tenderness of God and the sublime mission that had been entrusted to her: to be the mother of God. She did not keep the joy of the Gospel for herself, but she ran to share the same joy with her cousin Elizabeth and the child she was carrying in her womb. The disciple became missionary.
In the same way the congregation of Betharram will review its life so that every religious, every community and every pastoral activity, will join in this missionary outreach required by the new evangelization.

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