CONGREGAZIONE DELLA MISSIONE
CURIA GENERALIZIA
Via dei Capasso, 30 Tel. (39) 06 661 3061
00164 Roma – Italia Fax (39) 06 666 3831
e-mail: cmcuria@tin.it
29 June 2005
Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul
To the members of the Congregation of the Mission
Dear Brothers,
May the grace and peace of Our Lord Jesus Christ fill your heart now and forever!
In this circular I would like to highlight just some of the major points or decisions made in our last tempo forte meeting, at which we treated more than 50 items of interest for the well-being of the Congregation of the Mission throughout the world.
1. We initiated this tempo forte with something new. We did some ongoing formation for ourselves and invited all the members of the Curia to participate as well. The topic that we treated was vocational fragility. The talk was directed by a Salesian priest who is the General Councillor for Formation of their Congregation. With regard to vocational fragility various aspects were considered, from psychological, spiritual, moral and pedagogical perspectives. Vocation fragility has its roots in the dominant culture of today. We are living in a time of post-modernity, which is characterized by its complexity, making life into a maze without any signposts and produces a confused situation in which to make decisions. In addition, it is marked by the characteristics of transition with rapid change, the abandonment of old ways of doing things and the lack of new terms of reference. In this situation the crucial issue is the evident split between a faith perspective and a culture in a continual state of evolution, which produces a marked relativism with its consequent influence on clear thinking and vocational perseverance.
2. I presented ideas for the election of the Superior General for our next General Assembly. This was in response to the fifth decree approved and confirmed by the General Assembly of 2004, wherein the Superior General with his council will design, in consultation with the Visitors, a method of consultation as a way of preparing for the election of the Superior General in the next General Assembly. The final text of that is still to be worked out and presented in a future tempo forte meeting.
3. Conferences of Visitors and/or Provinces. This is another new section of our tempo forte meetings where we will hear reports from the different Conferences of Visitors and/or Provinces of the Congregation of the Mission. The first point that we discussed was a meeting of the General Council with the Presidents of the Conferences. The five presidents have received the invitation to participate in our tempo forte meeting of June 2006. Then we heard reports from the various Conferences: COVIAM for Africa, APVC for Asia, CEVIM for Europe, NCV for the United States and CLAPVI for Latin America. Points of interest:
∑ With regard to COVIAM we received, discussed and responded to a letter from the Conference of Visitors with regard to “the office for Africa in Rome.”
∑ With regard to APVC, the Vincentian Center for Asia-Pacific is expected to facilitate the offering of courses on Vincentian matters, to plan formation programs for members of the Vincentian Family, to develop the Conference’s website, and, with the Regional Formation Commission, to look into other possible programs that would be available to the formators in the region of Asia-Pacific.
∑ With regard to CEVIM, we received a letter from its new President, Corpus Delgado, with a presentation of the new Statutes. We also discussed a possible new mission project for evangelization in Europe, which was presented by two confreres from the Province of Austria.
∑ NCV has a new President as well, Andrew Bellisario. One of the points of interest is a proposal for a course of study on the Constitutions using the Internet, one of the commitments that was made by the Visitors at our most recent General Assembly.
∑ From CLAPVI, we received an outline of the plan for CLAPVI’s General Assembly which will be held in Peru in October, as well as the announcement of a meeting of CLAPVI in the Republic of Panama, treating the Social Doctrine of the Church for a week during September.
4. We also, following a mandate that was given us by the General Assembly, formed a Commission to modify and renew the Statutes of the Congregation of the Mission in the next General Assembly. The members of that Commission will be announced at a later date, when we have the confirmation of the participation of all. Their first meeting will be during our tempo forte meeting of March 2006.
5. Reconfiguration of Provinces. Taking up a work that was begun by the previous administration, we studied the possibility of promoting the reconfiguration of provinces. Decisions about reconfiguration are often very difficult for those involved. For that reason, the Superior General, with his council, will be taking a very active and decisive role in the process. We have considered a number of provinces throughout different regions of the Congregation and have categorized them into either short-range, medium-range or long-range processes of reconfiguration. Those in the short-range process have received a communication from the Superior General and his council and have been invited to initiate the process.
6. Financial Matters. We discussed and decided on the annual Mission Fund Distribution, being able to help different provinces and Conferences of Provinces for projects having to do with formation or service of the poor.
7. Vincentian Website. We had a report from the webmaster, John Freund, and also from Fr. Alfredo Becerra, who is the Curia’s link with the website. A unique identity for the Congregation website has been established and can be found under http://www.cmglobal.org. That contains therein matters pertaining to the different aspects of the Curia and offices of the Curia, services rendered to the Congregation throughout the world. Another point of interest is the Vincentian Encyclopedia, whose address is: http://www.famvin.org/wiki/. It is the most recent initiative which has potential for formation, collaboration, etc.
8. SIEV (International Secretariat of Vincentian Studies). We have named a new Executive Secretary and four other members. At a later date, the names of the new members of SIEV will be made know, once we have confirmation from all of them. There will be a transitional meeting for the members of the former team with the new team on 20-21 September here at the Curia in Rome.
9. CIF. We also had an evaluation and dialogue with the Director of the CIF Program, Fr. Hugh O’Donnell. He presented their evaluation, as well as a number of possibilities for new programs for CIF. I take this opportunity to urge all the Visitors of the Congregation of the Mission to take seriously their responsibility of encouraging the confreres to be involved in some type of ongoing formation, and above all in the deepening of our own Vincentian spirituality and charism, which the CIF Program does so well. We have been able to establish a half-scholarship for those confreres who come from provinces that are less well-off economically speaking. The council itself made a number of recommendations to the CIF Program, which will be left up to the Directors to consider and to implement, where possible and necessary.
10. We also had an interview with the Delegate for the Vincentian Family, Fr. Manuel Ginete. This was his first live presentation to the council since assuming his role as Delegate. He presented us his plan for the next five yeas and also shared with us some of the recent activities. One of the most interesting of these was a trip to Indonesia, where he gathered with a number of religious Communities, including the Daughters of Charity and members of the Congregation, all of whom are connected in one way or another with the charism of St. Vincent de Paul. Manny is going to be placing special emphasis on the English-speaking part of the world in order to reinforce, above all, the unity of the Vincentian Family there.
11. Then we spoke about missions and El Alto, Bolivia, where after the death of our missionary, Franc Pavli_, there are only three confreres laboring in this very difficult mission territory. Even though this will be mentioned in my Mission Appeal Letter in October, I ask all confreres to reflect on the possibility of offering yourselves as a missioner in this truly Vincentian work.
12. Tanzania. Now that the Province of Southern India has fully assumed the mission of Tanzania, we evaluated the former agreement between the Province of Southern India and the Curia and drew up a new agreement with less dependence on the General Curia in terms of government, administration and finances. I take this opportunity to thank the confreres of the South India Province, as well as those in the North India Province who are laboring in the mission of Tanzania, which is developing at a very rapid pace in terms of evangelization and vocations.
13. Personal interview with the Vice-Visitor of Sts. Cyril and Methodius, Fr. Paul Roche. He gave us an update on the life of the Vice-Province, which only a short while ago inaugurated its new Central House, called “God’s Gift.” One of the outcomes of our conversation was a decision to call a meeting to study and evaluate the contract that exists between the Vice-Province of Sts. Cyril and Methodius with the Provinces of Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia and the General Curia. We will evaluate that agreement during our tempo forte meeting in December.
That concludes this information with regard to some of the more major decisions that we made in the tempo forte of June. It was certainly intense, to the point that we had to extend the meeting an extra day, and even carry some of the points over into the next week, which were handled in a couple ordinary council meetings.
I take this opportunity to hope that all of you who will be going on vacation in the next couple of months will have a good rest, enjoy family and friends and reinvigorate yourselves so that you might continue to serve with even greater energy and love those who are our Lords and Masters, the Poor.
“If God is the center of your life, no words are necessary. Your mere presence will touch hearts” (St. Vincent de Paul).
Your brother in St. Vincent,
G. Gregory Gay, C.M.
Superior General
