On the path of the mission
Peggy Vivas, of the Norandina province, has recently settled in Curitiba, Brasil Centro-Sul, where she has started working as a voluntary Marist for the mission. We are including her testimony below.
It is a service organized by the Secretariat of Collaboration for Mission International (Cmi) in order to work with Coordinators of Province Volunteers (CPVs). The CPVs of the Americas will meet in Buenos Aires next May to specify the function of this international work.
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God always calls us and if we allow ourselves, He leads us towards unexpected paths, but full of happiness, which is Himself. On the Lord’s path, He has made me into a missionary Marist, in a Vicariate located in one of the extremes of my country; an experience of great richness to share my being a Marist with brothers, aside from learning to be part of an ecclesial community in communion with other laity and congregations. But the Lord keeps leading me. It is time to keep growing, to take other paths, to reach other lands. Since having had missionary experiences, sharing with others the commandment of Jesus in which he asks to “go, then, to all peoples everywhere and make them my disciples” (Matthew 28:19), the desire to go to the mission ad gentes has been in my heart.
The Lord gives me a wonderful opportunity! During the Provincial Assembly of the Norandina Province on the Marist Mission Assembly, Br Libardo spoke about the calls of the Marist Institute during these last few years. Among them is that of being “Prophets and Mystics” of today, the “inter” and the “Internationality.”
The words of Br Libardo encouraged me, they made me feel that this is the moment to create other disciples of Jesus in the style of Marcellin Champagnat in other lands, and then I communicated this desire of making an experience of solidarity.
Then the preparations began; some paperwork; filled with files; the hope of knowing the new land of the mission, which is Curitiba in the province of Brasil Centro-Sul; the search of the required documents for the visa; the pilgrimage by the institutions of the Venezuelan government for the slow processing of the documents; reviewing my health; trying to learn some Portuguese… A test of patience. Also, talking by videoconference with the people who are sorting out my stay in Brazil, knowing a little bit about the place where I will stay, the personal tasks proposed to me, a “we are happy to receive you in our Providence”… All of this has meant a set of feelings, positive and negative emotions, especially during these very difficult moments for my country. I have often asked myself if the moment to go on mission to other countries will arrive. But I also have the hope that this is what the Lord wants of me; that this will be an experience of God, with new lessons to be learned in these new lands.
And during all the hustle, I thought I was putting aside the most important thing: preparing my spirit, placing myself in front of the Lord and reviewing the attitudes with which I was going to this new mission that should strengthen one more, taking the life of Fr Champagnat as an inspiration to encourage that path and mission. The Montagne Year illuminates. I am going to Brazil trying to be attentive to the faces where I will find the Montagnes that the Lord will place in my path, to bear witness to his love and try to make them His disciples.
The letter that Br Emili Turú wrote for the start of the Montagne Year has given my heart more love. I have seen my reflection in his words. I am third generation Marist, a sentry with the hope of helping to bring forth the dawn of the Marist laity, going to the peripheries, enriching my spirituality, ready to face a new beginning with a ‘tent’ and a pilgrim heart… Today I dismount my tent to face a new geographical and personal trip. Like Mary, my heart magnifies the Lord for all I have lived and what is presented to me. I'm still on the path of the mission, trusting in God. The Lord has me a missionary out of me…
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Peggy J. Vivas R. – Marist Volunteer for the Mission