The Probation Community
On Thursday, 25th of January 2018,
twelve RSCJ, who are in Rome for probation
(a period of intensive preparation for final commitment),
received their name and devise.
Since the time of Sophie, each probation group has been given a name and a devise that will accompany them as they live their vocation into the future. While these are a unique gift to each probation group, it is also an invitation to the whole Society of the Sacred Heart.
In her conference Superior General Barbara Dawson RSCJ gave this probation group their name and devise:
Your experience during these months come during this year when we remember the courage and faithfulness of our sisters, Sophie and Philippine and the calls of our General Chapter 2016. A deep experience of love never turns inward. Love calls us, like it called Philippine and Sophie, to go beyond ourselves to search for ways to create new life. Like Sophie and Philippine, we need to contemplate in silence the generative Word of God, to live in the radical style of Jesus, deeply human and deeply united to the Source of Life. This union compels us to show forth the joyful and compassionate face of God, to be at the service of Life.
As we prayed over who you are and who you are becoming, we chose for you the name:
Intense love of Jesus
And your devise:
Transformed by the pierced Heart of Jesus,
sent beyond borders by the resurrected Christ to proclaim LOVE
Here are excerpts from the reflection Sister Barbara offered on the group's name and devise:
As RSCJ, we are called to an intense love of Jesus. You have remained in him, in silence and poverty of heart, in love. You have experienced how we are called to ”listen to the heartbeat of God in ourselves and in the world; to discern in silence and welcome the action of the Spirit that transforms us, energizes us and calls us to live our prophetic and educational mission”.... It is a life work to continually deepen this love, to nurture this relationship and to share deeply what this love means. This name of your probation expresses the movement of love, the reciprocity of receiving and giving.
Being so deeply united to Jesus you know in a new way, the inexhaustible source of life and love that flows from his pierced heart. The wounds of life – your own, those whom love and serve -- are the space from which Jesus taught you how strength for the mission flows from woundedness. You know in a new way that there is no love without being pierced. Jesus delivered himself up to death to give us life. We are transformed by entering into this mystery of love.... The life long journey for RSCJ comes from this experience of the pierced Heart of Jesus and calls us constantly to the wounds and sufferings of humanity, to become more compassionate, to search for justice and peace in a broken and incomplete world.
Like Mary Magdalene who risked coming in the dark of the morning to the empty tomb in search of her beloved Jesus, the experience of encountering the resurrected Christ gives us energy and creativity to set sail, to be sent beyond borders -- borders of the heart, of communities, of people, cultures, countries. Fearful, but not stopping, Mary met Jesus, her Teacher, who told her that the time had come for her to go out and proclaim the Good News of the Resurrection. It is the same call you have heard to be missionaries, to go beyond your known circles to build the body, to proclaim love in new ways, crossing frontiers, imagining the possibilities of truly being available to proclaim God’s love in our global community. It is from the Heart of the resurrected Christ that you are sent to discover and reveal the love of the Heart of Jesus.
As our Sisters make their final profession on Sunday, the 28th of January, we will rejoice with each of them, with their provinces, and with the whole Society. We join the Central Team in praying for them:
We pray for you and for the whole Society that, filled with God’s intense love, you may continue to walk and maybe run in the footsteps of Jesus with generosity of Heart. We pray that you may be wrapped in the love of our sisters who walk with you into your future. May the power that is within you give you courage to proclaim the love of God that dwells within you.
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