?Cruz Del Sur? Province
On August 31 at noon, we began the Province Assembly for the Cruz del Sur Province. Sixty six Brothers attended.
The Brothers working in Paraguay did not take part in the Assembly. They had had their own Assembly in their District while Councilor Generals Pedro and Antonio were on visitation. This year, the theme is Province Apostolate, Cruz del Sur, and the motto is ?On Mission, Brothers Who Care.?
This is an important matter; it represents the ?Province Perspectives.? Here one can discern a pastoral apostolate in the world of the marginalized. This apostolate will be put into place following a study of the situations in which we live, in which we are immersed as a Province of Marist Brothers. In these situations, we (both Brothers and lay people) wish to be a sign of the Kingdom, with solidarity as the starting point. Basing ourselves on a sense of Marist brotherhood, we wish to be a place, a leaven for creating meeting points within our various milieux (social, cultural, spiritual) and in the workaday world.
We start from the inspiration of our Marist roots and from our commitment to be creatively faithful to the roots. We consider the future perspectives which attract us and give us direction, thereby creating our institutional apostolate and helping us discern our attitudes and plans. Such will be the principles that guide our ?Brotherhood, an Inclusive Way.?
According to this principle, we wish to promote in all our work: a clear choice for justice
and solidarity. We give preference to being present with the poorest people, acting and plannin in such as way as to participate together in educating according to the Gospel, in a spirit of brotherly give and take.
The many years that we have spent in Argentina and Uruguay allow us to envision the future confidently, to have a sense of our responsibility to act now and to commit our-selves deeply to our work. This idea was offered to the assembly on Friday afternoon, in an audio visual presentation. Afterwards time was offered to discuss, to question, to ask for clarifications. In the second phase of the afternoon, group work took place in age groups. We looked at the means by which Brothers and communities might reach this Mission Perspective; what were the strong points, the weak points, the obstacles . . . at the personal, community and Provincial levels, in order to find what might give an impetus to the Mission Perspective.
On Saturday, Rodolfo Capalozza, a Palotine Father led our reflections on the new propositions which are arising in regard to the apostolate and the restructuring process.
In the evening, a good bit of time was given over to personal reflection, so as to prepare for the discernment of (a) the challenges to be taken on, and (b) the measures to be adopted so as to grow in creative fidelity at the three levels envisioned in the Mission Perspectives. The small-group sessions helped to make concrete our personal reflections and to put them in the form of proposals.
On Sunday morning, the groups presented their proposals in turn, in an open-mike gathering. The goal was to present ideas regarding the challenges and the action pro-posals for the coming Apostolate Year.
Afterwards, a written evaluation of the Assembly was requested.
The same day, September 2, at the conclusion of the Assembly, we had a celebration in honor of the 2007 Jubilarians.
This year the Jubilarians are Brothers Alberto Schonberguer (75 years), Augusto Jenemann and Juan Bautista Rovea (79 years), Isaac Diez Olea, Santiago Sanchez Gascon, Luis Soler (60 years), and Horacio José Maria Bustos (25 years).
In the presence of many relatives and friends, we concluded the celebration with the Eucharist, celebrated by Fr. Ignacio PĂ©rez del Viso, S.J., a close friend of the Brothers.
So it was that we honored our Brothers, models of fidelity, of the religious value of our Gospel mission in the southern part of the Americas.
Provincial Secretary