“To bring out the best in each person with whom we share our day-to-day lives in order to offer and respond positively to the demands placed on us at this time.” This is the challenge facing the new Provincial Team for the next three years, in the words of Sister General Maria Teresa Cuervo, who read out the appointment on April 6 during a Eucharist celebrated at the headquarters of the Province of Europe. The Mass was full of symbolic elements, such as the presentation of some newly germinated plants (they were planted on Good Friday) to the seven sisters chosen to “animate and coordinate the life and mission of the sisters and communities” of Europe, “preserving the unity of the charism in communion with the Congregation,” with all its strengths and vulnerabilities.
“It is time to take advantage of the diversity that exists in you, in the sisters of the province” to be “bearers of the Good News” with “a taste of the Vedruna charism”, a “responsibility that concerns all of us”, the sisters and also the laity, whose voice, “very diverse too”, the general encouraged to listen.
Maria Teresa Cuervo offered the new team the support of the General Team, encouraging the seven sisters to persevere in their vocation of service. In spite of the fact that “stumbling blocks will not be lacking”, she added, “as Joaquina’s daughters we are resilient, we will get up looking at the horizon marked by the Gospel and attentive to the reality that is shouting, and remembering the many possibilities we have. Although small and little, everything adds up”.
The Provincial, María Gracia Gil, responded to these words by assuring that the new Team “will put its heart, soul and life” into the work entrusted to it. “And we do so with the confidence that this Province, this Family, is led by the Compassionate One,” he continued. “This has been the case for almost 200 years. This is why we have reason for hope”, despite the fact that “we are living in critical times at the global level” and that “there are certainly many open fronts at the level of the Province”.
As important as the internal challenges are, however, “we don’t want to focus on our own,” he said. After alluding to “difficult situations at the global level” such as the wars in Gaza and Ukraine or the crisis in Haiti, María Gracia Gil spoke of the need to offer convincing answers.
“Yes,” she concluded, “we are living in difficult times, and for this reason the call to hope is all the more urgent. We are invited, we are urgently called to work on a project of hope for all humanity, which needs all of us, all of us”.
Broadcast of the appointment of the Provincial Team
