On the 9th, the feast of Saint Cándida, Graciela, our Superior General, wrote her 19th letter to the Daughters of Jesus. She used the text of the Eucharist as her heading:
“I give praise to you Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned
you have revealed them to the childlike”.
Mt. 11:25
The letter begins by greeting us on the feast of “our Holy Foundress” and wishing “that this is a day to thank for so much received in the Congregation and to pray for her”.
She reminds us of no. 21 of the General Plan of Formation “which can stimulate us all to progress, with joy and confidence, on the path of divine service”:
“Love for Jesus Christ which ought to be integrating the whole person affectively carries with it the desire to be identified with Him in His self-emptying and humiliation, to be ready to lose everything: fame, esteem, honor, and even losing oneself, ceasing to be the center so that He will fill it, and find there the pain and injustices of the world”. PGF 21, CFI 137, and 138.
And she comments that “we receive in it the invitation to put Jesus always at the center and let the Father work in us what the Spirit wants to capture in our people and, through us, in the world.
She goes on to say that “we have seen this in the life of our beloved Foundress. A woman of faith, who placed God, and an incarnate God, at the center of her life as a Foundress. Cándida María de Jesús would continue to encourage us today in faith, faith, faith, alive, constant, eternal. Let us thank the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit for the person of Juana Josefa who allowed herself to be transformed by God until she became a ripe fruit for surrender on a day like today, 109 years ago.”
And, as always, leaves us some FAMILY NEWS.
1. Presentation of the work to deepen the Determination: “To assume our choice”
We continue as the Daughters of Jesus to deepen in the Determination of the CG XVIII. In this fifth stage, Mª Inez Furtado and Odette Bechara, Daughters of Jesus from the Region of Brazil, invite us to make a reading of the Determination illuminated by the writings of M. Cándida and Fr. Herranz. You can access the material by clicking on the image.
2. Sending to the General Curia
Sr. Gloria Albiac Ventura has been sent to the General Curia.
Gloria will join this community in September. She is assigned to be an aid to the Secretary General and to learn everything related to this office.
3. Our Apostolic Presence in Venezuela
What process has been followed and what future does it open up? It is narrated by the Provincial Superior of Andean America in her letter nº 8 to the Province:
1º There was a specific situation
We have all been accompanying the complex situation in Venezuela in
the last few years and the difficulties we have been encountering in sending sisters for visa issues.
that does not allow us to carry out the plans, to strengthen our presence in Venezuela. So,
2º With the provincial government, we have considered the process as a whole and reflected on various data and information from recent years.
3º Last April, we had an expanded council, in which we listened to some of the sisters who know best inside the current apostolic project that we accompany there.
4º Also throughout these months, I have been talking with sisters who have been sent to Venezuela.
5º After analyzing the reality and listening to those who know more closely as well as consulting the opinion of her counselors, the provincial Superior says:
6º I have decided to make the request to the Superior General for the suppression of this presence.
7º y 8º The Superior general, with the data that I have presented to her and, after considering it with her government, has decided to close our community in Venezuela.
And the Superior General ends by saying:
“It always painful to leave a country. However, we are left with the peace of mind that we have exhausted all possible means and remedies. Now, the provincial government is outlining how to continue to accompany the projects that the Daughters of Jesus carried there. A common apostolic discernment, laypeople and Daughters of Jesus, will help us find the Will of the Lord for this place so in need.
9º I invite you to be grateful for our presence through so many generous sisters in that country so dear to all of us and, to continue praying, so that the Spirit may continue to fertilize the seed sown there.”
4. Our presence in Amazon
We gather the literal words of Graciela:
After a good time dedicated to the discernment of our possible presence in the Amazon, I have come to concretize our participation in the Intercultural Network of Amazonian Bilingual Education (REIBA). This project was born a year ago, as a response to the Synod of the Amazon. It is part of the Panamazónic Ecclesial Network(REPAM)and has the support of the Latin American Conference of Religious(CLAR). Its current Coordinator is Fr. Pablo Mora, SJ. Its headquarters are located in Manaus (Brazil).
This project works with volunteers – lay and religious – and has the purpose of supporting the education of the Amazonian peoples.
It is a project with which the Congregation commits itself for two years. It is necessary that the volunteers who are going to participate in it receive training that will last six months and will be online. At the same time, the local team that will receive them will also be prepared. During these six months of training, the volunteers are in their places of origin. This preparation began in August and will conclude in December. At the end of January or beginning of February 2022, the sending will be made to specific places in the Amazon.
The Sisters who have been sent to it are Srs. Kenia Cedeño and Yomaris Tolentino. With them and with other religious and laypeople, we will go to the Amazon.
Along with the availability of these sisters, we also thank God for having shown us this path, of risk and evangelical audacity, in favor of our most disadvantaged brothers. It is a response to the request of the Church expressed in the conclusions of the Synod and a request of the HPLC, which insists on the presence of the VR in the midst of the Amazonian peoples. A presence of much gratuity and audacity that places us in the line of what the Determination asks of us:
“Evangelical poverty in Mother Candida is to go and live and proclaim the Gospel. Availability leads us to be in continuous inner roaming, to leave ourselves, and to go to those most in need. It asks us to be bold, as a Body, to reach the frontiers of today’s world and sets us to listen to the cry of the world to share the Mission of Christ.” CGXVIII, Det. No. 13
She ends her encouraging letter by entrusting to the Lord this news of the Body and wishing that “all these small steps will be an occasion for the union of spirits, to pray for one another, and to ask the Spirit to confirm the decisions made.”