Campinas novitiate

As the flight from Lisbon to Brazil was direct to Campinas, the Co-coordinator of the Project Ad Gentes profited by a days wait to give a session of information on this project which is at the heart of the missionary work of the Congregation, since it was begun in 2005, following the Conference of the Provincials in Sri Lanka.In front of the formation team and the fourteen novices of the house, the broad lines of dialogue were given by the witness of those who had been recently sent on mission., that is to say the members of the group ?Davao 2010?. In summary here are the principles which can characterize the missionary Marist.- The Marist missionary (laity or Brother) is he who attempts to give a Sense to his life, by taking as its foundation the Word of God and the – Marist patrimony (spirituality and mission).- The Marist missionary is one who nourishes his spiritual life by moments of profound prayer; in prayer, that is to say in closeness with the Lord,- He finds the strength to surmount the difficulties inherent in missionary work.- The Marist missionary who experiences in his life God?s call and responds to it with enthusiasm, confident moreover in the protection of the Lord as well as in his own strength.- The Marist missionary is capable of working in a team, with other Congregations, lay and religious), and accepting large sacrifices to respond to the Kingdom of God on earth.- The Marist missionary is the whom who is ready to welcome with fresh attitudes, ready to a total opening to the newness of God who expresses himself in the cultures where he is called to live the Gospel; from this opening surges respect for local culture, being able to confront it with the Gospel when needed.- The Marist missionary is the one who accepts the challenges of the mission, whether they are cultural or ideological, and becomes a worker for the Gospel with a total availability so that Marcellin?s dream might be embodies in various cultures.- The Marist missionary is the one who lives in joy the call of God to this vocation and feels himself to be a member of the wider Marist family which thinks in a special way to work, pastorally, and as a missionary, among the poorest and most ill-favored.- The Marist missionary is one who is open to all missionary works which are asked of him at any time and anywhere: the mission has no age and one can serve the mission at any age, it is the same for geographical place: the missionary accepts to being sent there were the need is greatest.- The Marist missionary is he who remains attentive to the signs of the times and examines them in prayer in order to answer them according to God?s wishes: to do this he seeks help from human discernment and prayer- The Marist missionary is he who is convinced that God is guiding his life for he lives in intimacy with Him. God is his way and his guide. Moreover he knows that it is the spirit of God who guides him on the paths of the mission.- The Marist missionary is one who obeys God ? an obedience of faith for doing his holy will ? knowing that, by obeying, he is responding to the dream that God has of him: a dream that is made solid in the fact of doing good for all His sons.- The Marist missionary is the one who establishes himself in the life of the people to whom he is send and has only the dreams and hopes that these people have, their dreams and their sufferings even when he knows that often no great thing can be done. In faith, he knows that the grace of God transcends his insufficiencies.- The Marist missionary is the one who is ready to leave home and friends to set out far away to serve God in the person of the poor; in this attitude of opening up to God he indicates the experience of his love which leads him on the mission paths.- The Marist missionary is the one who lives in a perspective of faith and is very attentive to individual and common prayer, in which he deepens his relationship with God.. He knows that in this deepening he finds the strength and the joy to serve His people, in the mission.- The Marist missionary is he who never forgets Mary, our Good Mother, in her missionary life. At the Visitation Mary had been the first missionary of the Church, for she carried Christ, even physically to Mary. It is she who inspires his missionary attitudes and it is in her that he finds the strength to give Christ to others to make burst out in them a chant of praise to the Lord________________Br. Teófilo MingaCoordinator of the Project AD GENTESCampinas, 1st. October 2010.