Novitiate of Matola
Moffat Phiri, Steven Banda and Stephen Muleba from Zambia and Chifundo Nkhoma and Steven Chinsolo from Malawi were officially accepted as novices last Saturday, the 16th February, 2013. They have entered into the initiation period or the rite of passage which will take them two years. In the novitiate a novices enters into an intensive spiritual journey. The period introduces the novice to religious life through a rite of passage from death to life. Cardinal Pironio says, “The very purpose of the novitiate demands that a privileged place be assigned to contemplation, to doctrinal and spiritual formation, as well as to the practice of sincere and open fraternal charity.” As Marists, prayer is the pillar of our life both at a personal and community level.
The Comboni says, “Initiation into the clan marks the passage from passivity to the responsible assumption of active roles, in harmony and in cooperation with other members of the group. In the same way the novitiate must assist the novice to move from simple submission to the internalizing of the norms that regulate his life and to feel responsible for the life of the Institute.” Without internalization the novitiate becomes a superficial period and becomes like building our faith on the rock which is not deep to sustain us during stormy moments of our life. Our formation guide stresses that the novice is the best artisan of his own formation.
In this year of faith, let the novitiate help us to be men rooted in faith that can move mountains. Let us resist temptations that may make us betray the values of religious life. This period in our life requires good will, a condition that our Founder stressed for all interested to be Marist. Good luck and God bless.
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Br. Simeon Banda, fms, Matola, Mozambique.