For an hour, this Friday, March 2nd, Bro. Yannick HOUSSAY, Superior General, presented his Report of the last six years to the Capitulants.
The 50-page substantial document has three purposes:
+ To present the Congregation today, with its challenges and weaknesses, as the Superior General perceives it.
+ To outline a report in the light of the 2012 Chapter Acts
+ To nourish the prayer and reflection of the Capitulants so that they can listen to the calls of the Spirit.
Bro. Yannick also recalled that this Chapter corresponds to the 50th anniversary of the 1st session of the renovation chapter held in Jersey in 1968. We will have the opportunity to come back to this on the site.
At this moment, it is not a matter of reporting the content of the Report, but of presenting the main points of the Summary.
- The Congregation today.
Our Mennaisian vocation: gift to welcome, to develop, to transmit.
The Mennaisian presence in the world
2.- The last 6 years re-read in the light of the 2006 Chapter
The vocation and mission of the Brother in community
The animation of Provinces and Districts
Christian education of children and young people
Young people and the discernment of vocations
Initial formation
The Mennaisian Family: communion for the mission
The service of the poor
Some specific points: child protection, Rule of life and structures of the congregation, communication and information, archives and historical studies, Mother House of Ploërmel.
Two points of attention again about this presentation:
Br. Superior General relied on the documents of the Vatican Commission of Consecrated Life – “Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life” – CICLSAL, and expressed his vision, his analysis and personal suggestions on the above points.
Finally, let us quote one of the sentences of the document Scrutate – published by the CICLSAL -, quoted above in the report: “We are not called to be guides overwhelmed and preoccupied by the administrative aspect, but to a service of the authority which indicates, with an evangelical clarity, the way to go together, in the unity of hearts, in a fragile present where the future is in the making.”