Missionaries know, from the Common Rules, and the present Constitutions point it out as well, that the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity is one, along with the Incarnation, that should be celebrated with solemnity and as much devotion as we are able. Yesterday, a large part of the missionaries who have arrived in Mexico for the meeting of the Visitors, did that, surely with devotion, and certainly with solemnity in the student’s chapel in Of the Mexican Province in Tlalpan.
Solemnity, because of the beautiful morning with which the Lord blessed us to celebrate his feast; solemnity in the expression of fraternity around the table of the Lord of such a large group of confreres from so many parts of the world, along with the seminary community and other members of the Vincentian family and family and friends of the house. Solemnity because three young men from the seminary, Eliseo, Juan and Toribio, were definitively incorporated into the Congregation of the Mission and made vows to follow Christ, Evangelizer of the poor, in poverty, chastity and obedience.
The Superior General, who presided at the Eucharist, exhorted us to construct a community of love in the image of the Trinity. A community not closed in on itself, but turned towards others, especially the most poor, as an expression of the love with which God loves us. This is what those young men express in their vow of dedication to the poor for their whole lives in the Congregation. Fidelity to the vows, as the the Congregation explains them, will help them to be an expression of God’s love. Poverty is an option for the poor, to live like them and with them. Chastity is an expression of healthy love for others as an expression of God’s love in the world. Obedience is a tie to the authority in the Christian community, in the concrete way this is undertaken in the Congregation of the Mission, as the search for the will of God, who is the only lord and sovereign of everything.
The celebration was very solemn, beautifully accompanied by the songs prepared and sustained by the rythym of the students, and followed fervently by the whole assembly. After the ceremony, the seminary community offered us refreshments.
Later on those who had arrived for the meeting of the Visitors had lunch at the provincial house and had a few hours to walk around the center of the city until the hour came to move to the site of the meeting, the CEM center(Episcopal Conference of Mexico).
