On November 3, the Vedruna family gathered around the altar table to give thanks and celebrate 90 years of Vedruna presence in Uruguay.
The Sisters arrived in Uruguay in 1934, and on March 4 of the same year they took charge of the Santa Elena School located on Rivera Street. With a beautiful and moving ceremony, the new Community of Sisters was installed there.
In 1950 their presence was expanded, making the project initiated by Joaquina de Vedruna and the desire to “extend their arms and embrace the needs of all peoples” a reality. The Sisters, in their evangelizing zeal, traveled by streetcar to an area called Chacarita to collaborate in catechesis. The Sacred Heart of Jesus School, created and directed since 1902 by the Association of Catholic Young Ladies, was located there. Two years later they took over the direction and went to live in the precarious school. In 1962 the transfer was made to the Carmelite Association of the Vedruna Charity.
And that is how the Vedruna Charism arrived in our country. The seed that took root in Spain began to bear fruit in our land: Montevideo, Treinta y Tres, Melo and Noblia.
At present there is presence of Sisters in Montevideo and Melo. In Noblia, the Charism continues to beat through the Vedruna Laity.
That spirituality that touched our Uruguayan soil, today touches and acts in our hearts, and continues to illuminate many roads with strength, diligence, perseverance, charity, in the plan that GOD LOVE designed for Joaquina and her followers.
We thank God for Joaquina, for the Congregation, for the whole Vedruna Community that struggled and struggles constantly to be faithful to Jesus, to the Vedruna charism, to the identity and principles that come from St. Joaquina:
To work to please God in the good of our neighbor.
Marianela Lioret, LV
