Intensive deliberations November 4-30

Brother Superior General and his Council met in Rome for a long series of meetings to examine pressing concerns in detail, and take care of routine governmental matters.

Aims
1. Review the first year of the new Council and the General Administration.
2. Build community in regard to life and work, a task of special importance due to everyone?s departing later on to animate the Institute throughout the world
3. Work out a plan for working together and as teams when the Council visits Provinces. November 8-10 has been set aside for working with other brothers to prepare for the retreats in the Cono sur countries and Brazil.
4. Evaluate the policy for animating the Institute during the first year: language studies, contact visits, retreats and visits for continents, the call to other brothers to assist the Council, and work in commissions.
5. Decide government policy:
? Plenary sessions: dates and agenda items.
? A review the report on the General Administration prepared by the team that studied ways to improve the services that the Administration provides.
? Responsibilities of link Councilors, contact persons for specific Marist regions, who serve as the portal for access to the General Council.
? Decisions taken on various topics concerning the ordinary life of the Institute.
? Meetings to listen to brothers in the General Administration: Giovanni Bigotto (Postulator), Lluís Serra (Publications and Communications), Juan Miguel Anaya (Procurator), Jean-Pierre Cotnoir (Archives) and Allen Sherry (Secretariat for International Solidarity – BIS).
? Deliberations on the four new Secretariats: Mission and Laity, Religious Life and Vocation Ministry, Government, and the Evangelical Use of Goods.
? Establishment of commissions for personnel, computer communications, publications… and naming their members.
? Definition and description of internal operating procedures of the General Council

Program
1. Orientation days for 23 new Provincials/District Superiors (held in Rome September 10-20)
2. Daily Council meetings to reflect, share, discern and y decide:
? Naming Provincials after studying the sondages sent in by brothers in the Provinces
? Status of the restructuring process in new Provinces
? Topics from Provinces concerned about ordinary management issues
? Search and naming of brothers for posts in the General Administration
? Study and approval of the planning, vision and strategies of the six commissions: Religious Life, Vocation Ministry, Mission, Laity, Government, and Use of Evangelical goods.
3. Contacts, aid, and accountability
? Situations of political conflict, as in Ivory Coast
? Difficult situations in other countries
4. Meetings have taken place to exchange ideas with the Marianists, the brothers in Manziana, the brothers at the International College in Rome.

· Among the many decisions having to do with governing the Institute on a day-to-day basis, especially during this plenary session, we highlight the following:

BULLETIN OF THE GENERAL COUNCIL ? DECISIONS
1. Naming Brother Fernando MEJÍA PÉREZ as the new Provincial of the Province of Central Mexico.
2. Naming Brother Eugène KABANGUKA to be the first Provincial of the new Province of East Central Africa (comprising The Central African Republic, D.R. of Congo, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania), which will begin officially in April 2003
3. Naming Brother Manuel DE LEON to be the new Provincial of the Province of the Philippines.
4. Naming Brother Paulo Celso FERRAREZI of the Province of South Central Brazil to be Executive Secretary of the Commissions for Mission and the Laity, beginning 01 January 2003.
5. Approving the recommendation made by the Restructuring Commission for the three Provinces of Castilla, León, and Portugal (combining on 02 January 2004) that the new Province be called ?Compostela?.
6. Naming Brother Mariano MEDINA as the Superior of the General House Community until the end of his mandate as Assistant Econome General on 30 June 2003.
7. As required by C.160.5, naming members of the Finance Committee to study with the Econome General financial deliberations sent to Brother Superior General and his Council for approval: Brothers Maurice BERQUET, Peter RODNEY, Juan ARCONADA, Guy PALANDRE, and Dominick PUJIA.

Commission on the Evangelical Use of Goods meets in Rome
PLAN of DISCERNMENT
Members of the Evangelical Use of Goods Commission, Brothers Maurice Berquet, Guy Palandre, and Antonio Martínez met in Rome December 4-10. Brother Dominick Pujia, the fourth member of the Commission, was unable to attend.
La Commission is developing a discernment process on this topic. Later it will offer the results of its efforts to the Provinces and assist them in its implementation. This is in response to section 48.5 in ?Choose Life,? the Message of the 20th General Chapter.
Previous to this meeting, a brother in each Province was asked to fill out and return a questionnaire. The Commission has received 30 replies, covering almost the entire Institute. Besides the Gospel and our Constitutions, commission members have made use of other documents such as the Acts of recent General Chapters, Brother Benito?s Circular ?Concerning the Evangelical Use of Material Goods,? material that Brothers Seán Sammon and Luis García Sobrado presented to the Union of Superiors General (USG), and the conclusions of the May 2002 Assembly of the USG.
Commission members are continuing their work individually and together with their fellow members will share via the Internet the results of their contributions for the future Plan of discernment on the evangelical use of goods. More meetings have been scheduled for March 2003 and January 2004. The objective is to have a Plan of Discernment in place by the beginning of 2004.

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