The Recollection Day of our Lay Mission Partners and Benefactors held last April 3, 2023 (Holy Monday) at Canossa House of Spirituality was an experience of “surprise” and of being “led by the Spirit” for all 46 mission partners, benefactors and friends.
Fr. Marcelo Manimtim, CM, (Fr. Manny) Recollection Facilitator, used the method of synodality as the way to set lives on fire in a day supposedly spent in silence and personal prayer!
After the initial uneasiness with the new “method” yet willingness of the participants to group together and share, a certain warmth and “at-homeness” with one another set in. In fact, everybody seemed “lighted up” and eager to share more than the questions asked:
- in your desire to continue doing well or even better in your work, what is it that you still need to see? Is there anything that you would like the administrators of the school/hospital/ or the Sisters-in-charge of the work to provide so that you can do your work better?
- You have seen how crucial is your role in making the charism of the Canossian family become more alive and reach out to more people. Knowing the power that you have, what will you be willing to do now? Be concrete about the actions you are willing to take.
The series of talks of Fr. Manny shed light on the role of the lay in the Church, the Pope’s desire to hear from them by way of synodality, the role of the Lay in the growth of faith in the Church and its similarity with the growth and spread of the Canossian charism.
He used the story of St. Vincent de Paul to encourage the participants to do “more” which in our General Chapter document is “to love without measure”, pointing to the common vision of the love of Christ Crucified as the source of immense energy for our love for the poor expressed concretely by of St. Louise de Marillac and St. Magdalene of Canossa.
Fr. Manny spoke of Pope Francis’ attention to and emphasis on the persons who are in the peripheries and in the margins and on his teaching that every act of charity is a concrete manifestation of God’s love.
Concluding with the presentation of Elizabeth and Mary as models of lives that are transformed
by the revelation of God’s plan in their lives and their being touched by the Spirit, Fr. Manny also drew his concluding statement from the participants’ experience of sharing saying: “the support given so that something more becomes a reality is a concrete way of setting the life of our community on fire”.
-Sr. Violeta Calingasan, FdCC