“What do you expect and desire from the 2007 General Chapter?”

The General Councillors express their expectations and desire in view of the 109th General Chapter of the Order

José Narlaly

Vicar General. Councillor for  Formation

“A strong commitment to dispose the personnel and the economic budget for the formation”

My desire for the General Chapter is to implement the decisions of the General Congregation in Mexico:

That each Jurisdiction prepare adequately its own formators; that we may organise two meetings, of at least a week duration, every three years, at a specifically Trinitarian level: one general for the first year after the Provincial Chapters, and the other regional the second year after the mentioned chapters.

The general Councillor in charge of formation will co-ordinate, prepare and direct them, starting from 2007. The regional meetings are: United States-Canada, Latin America; Africa-Madagascar; Europe, India-Korea. To establish one year formation and preparation for the solemn profession:  This will help reciprocal knowledge, a deepening of one’s own identity, making apostolic experiences in line with the charism and growing in improved inter-communication.  This formation must not be only theoretical, but also practical. The coming General Chapter will elect the place and the responsible person of the formative team. The cost of this experience will enter the budget of the General Curia.

We need a quality permanent formation not only at theoretical, but also at life level, for which it is necessary that the General Secretariat for Formation prepare programme of permanent formation, insisting on human, spiritual, theological and Trinitarian formation, to be sent to all jurisdictions, so that they may adopt it in their reality.

To facilitate the communication and dialogue among all the brothers of the entire world, every jurisdiction will see to that both in initial and permanent formation, the religious shall study either, English or Spanish, besides one’s own. This will facilitate our international meetings and the relations among the religious in all the places where the Order is present.

This will imply a very strong commitment on behalf of all the jurisdictions in disposing the personnel and sufficient economic funds.

 Giovanni Martire Savina

Councillor for the Trinitarian Family

“My expectations and desires are in syntony with the General Directory and Project of Life for the Trinitarian Laity”

In the cover letter for the Life Project of the laity, the General Minister has written, “The approval of the Project of Life for the Laity on behalf of the Holy See is a motive of great joy for the whole Family, particularly for the Trinitarian Laity in its various forms and expressions. … It is necessary to ask God Trinity once again, the gift of “our conversion to the Family”.

This is what I hope from this Chapter, that we may convert ourselves to the Family, that each of us, respectful of one’s own role, may feel responsible of increasing, of favouring the growth and of accompanying the Family spiritually.

Among the most underlined desires of the 2005 IVAssembly in Mexico, we find that of creating groups of young Trinitarians where the Family may be present. All our houses should create or found youth groups and assist, guide and form them with the means, which we consider to be most efficient: lectio divina, Eucharistic prayer, commitment to the urgent needs in one’s territory, while forming them to the specific Trinitarian charism. Without youth, we have no future!

The charism can no longer be the monopoly of the religious It belongs to all men! It belongs to the Church, for the glory of the Trinity and for the redemption of our brothers who suffer because of their faith in Christ. It belongs to the poor and is for the poor. “The charism becomes stronger by being shared”.

The new structure we are trying to create in the Trinitarian Laity “per Associations”, has its objective: to be more united, more efficient and meaningful. We can no longer remain divided, minding our own small orchard.

We have done a lot during the past twenty years to the end of “becoming one Family”. However, I think that it is time to try and come out of a generic mentality, out of the catacombs. Therefore, a CILT Commission, guided by the undersigned, is going to elaborate a directory for the International Trinitarian Laity of the whole Family, aiming at motivating communication and reciprocal knowledge, in view of emulation and mutual help, of listening to one another and feeling how beautiful it is to belong to the same great Trinitarian Family.

Angelo Buccarello

Councillor for the Missions

“I wish that the chapter confirm the missionary commitment and promote the assistance to the missions”

First of all I express my joy to know that the Chapter will take place in Madagascar. I hope that the 2007 General Chapter may reflect more concretely on the Mission, on the Trinitarian apostolate, the exigencies it implies and the forms we have to adopt. I hope that, besides conforming ourselves to the Word, we have the courage to self-criticism and accept  external criticism.

We must rediscover how to carry on our works together as community. To be one enriches us and makes us more efficient in our mission.

The Missions are an important field in our work. It is the diamond point of our last ten years of work. This chapter will have to plan a deepening of the apostolic mission for the coming six years, not only for what concerns the content, but also for the method of working as missionaries. As a responsible person for the missions, I wish that the chapter may confirm the missionary commitment and may promote the assistance to the Missions with personnel and material means, to the end of working in favour of non-believers and the poor.

We cannot forget the courageous men who preceded us in the struggle of liberation of their brothers. They turned their life into a gift for others, after the Trinitarian style. Shall we be able to go back to this missionary spirit required by our difficult times?

Full of passion for today’s man, are we ready to accept a life of discipline so that the chains of slavery may not enslave us also? If we want our houses to be authentic communities of life, rather than refugees of individualisms, we must reflect with our discernment on the Trinitarian model of mission, which is a form of fraternal love in favour of justice, mercy and human rights.

In the exercise of our mission, we must be attentive to ignore our culture in order to listen to that of others. We must take the Gospel and the Trinitarian spirituality of liberation as a transforming element of today’s and future humanity. The General Chapter in Moramanga must give the impulse to our Trinitarian mission in this sense, if we want the renewal and strengthening of our charism.

We cannot ignore that only a few draw benefits from the earth, while it is a valley of tears for the majority. We must apply our pastoral theology to local situations; our missionary action, inspired on the Trinitarian love, must privilege the least favoured ones. The voices of the new slaves in Madagascar, rise up before the participants of the 109th General Chapter. To listen to them is our historical responsibility.

Alfred Couturier

Councillor for the Apostolate

“A meeting for the updating of the Trinitarian Apostolate, in favour of the Christians persecuted because of their faith”

The 2007 Chapter is for me the first Meeting. A meeting of animators who seek the development of the Order and the Trinitarian Family for today’s Church.

A meeting with an Order in full development:  More than 200 youths are getting ready to incarnate our charism in various parts, completely new for us. This Chapter will have to seek the newness and updating, which we need to bring into our apostolic formation, after the basic formation for the priesthood and religious life. What kind of professional and complementary formation does the Order need in order to be one with “the persecuted because of faith” in today’s world? It is fundamental for this chapter to give the Word and to listen to the echo of the Trinitarian charism in the heart of the youth under formation.

It is a meeting with the challenge of internationality. In fact, to me, every work aiming at answering directly to the persecuted Christians because of faith, will be the work of community life, made up by all the members of the family from different nationalities.

All of us are called not only to incarnate the charism in our own countries in favour of today’s world, but also to face the challenge of a common life, of reciprocal knowledge, of shared commitment, in view of a liberation mission, like that of the Sudan-Cairo project (which, anyhow, we must launch again). The future of the apostolic development of the Order passes through the development of our attitudes open to internationality.

A meeting with the persecuted Christians because of faith:  The great challenge of our apostolate is not so much the fact of keeping a work rather than another.  How to act so that each of our apostolic sections (parishes, social works, spirituality houses, boarding house, hospitals and prisons), may be imbued and inspired by the exorbitant suffering of today’s persecuted Christians?.

The charism of the Trinitarian apostolate does not invite all men and women to do one and the same thing at the vanguard of the battle for the liberation of the persecuted Christians because of their faith, but convokes us to be at the service of the liberation of the persecuted Christians. The General Chapter should truly commit itself seriously on this Trinitarian identity and make plan of action so that this identity, so much described in the past ten years of our literature, may truly become our own make in all our apostolic actions.