To the Sisters, Novices and Postulants
To the Associates, Family, Staff and Friends
My best wishes to you all on the Feast of St. Francis. May the saint of Assisi with his example of joyful faith in God and a life reconciled with others and with Creation accompany us on the paths of peace in these times clouded by the darkness of wars.
Let us respond to Pope Francis’ invitation to all Christians to live a day of prayer and fasting for peace on October 7.
The second session of the Synod on Synodality is now beginning. I would like to share with you some thoughts offered by Fr. Radcliffe OP at the opening retreat of the Synod, commenting on four Gospel scenes. In his first reflection, Fr. Radcliffe invited the members of the Synod to see themselves not as “representatives of parties in the Church,” but rather as “fellow searchers, who are wounded yet joyful.” He affirmed that “we shall only become preachers of the Resurrection if we are alive in God,” then invited the Synod to name the fears that prevent this fullness of life: fear of being hurt, fear of rejection, fear that one’s hopes in the Church will be despised. But these fears are unfounded, because the Church is in the hands of the Lord.
The Synod is not the place where structural changes are negotiated. It is a place to choose life, for conversion and forgiveness. Fr. Radcliffe then noted that in the journey of our life given to Christ, we sometimes have the desire to reclaim that gift and to seek a life for ourselves alone. Last year, when the Synod first began, Fr. Radcliffe believed that the real challenge was to overcome the opposition between traditionalists and progressives. On the contrary, the real challenge is how the Church can embrace all the different cultures of the world and yet be united. The different cultures are called to unite while preserving their differences, neither towering over the other. To do so, they must listen to each other with humility.
Lastly, Fr. Radcliffe referred to Peter’s profession of love in John 21. He noted that the Church is built on the rock of God’s undeserved trust in Simon Peter, and ended his reflection with a question: “Will we dare to trust each other, despite some failures? This Synod depends on it”.
I wanted to share these brief notes with you. Because the call addressed to the Synod also extends to all of us SSMs as we seek to renew our fraternal life, by overcoming individualism, divisions and fears, to give ourselves to the mission as one body.
May the Lord give us peace!
Sr. Samuela Maria Rigon
General Superior