Montserrat García and María Trinidad Acuña
Motivation: We would like to invite you to have this moment of prayer with a few words from two students of the Sacred Heart Apoquindo School in Chile who gave as a testimony to the educators what it meant to have studied in our School.
They are Montserrat García and María Trinidad Acuña. A week ago they celebrated their graduation, becoming alumni.
May we welcome these inspiring words and may they reflect what Madeleine Sophie dreamed for the "Little Society":
"It is difficult to describe our feelings in this fastpaced, individualized and convulsive world. A world that, at times, does not understand the fire that we carry within us, a flame that we learned to cultivate since we were little and that has made us who we are today and who we want to be in the future.
The Sacred Heart is a figure that we heard from our educators since we arrived at the school when we were 4 years old. In the beginning, that open heart was taught to us through drawings and stories and that Jesus was always with us hand in hand. But little by little it became something much deeper, an inner search. A tireless and eternal search that did not stop at retreats, volunteer services or First Friday Masses. It began to be a search for Jesus around us. It became a daily, constant encounter, in which every day, as we pray in the mornings with our courses, we reconnect with what unites us. An image that invites us to love everyone and to give ourselves to the
service of others without expecting anything in return, but also to let ourselves be loved by the Heart of Jesus at all times.
At the School, through you (educators), you have taught us that the cultivation of our faith does not remain only in words, but acts through the encounter with others, of looking with the eyes of God who welcomes us with complete openness. This is much more powerful than just praying countless Hail Marys that are not incarnated in reality.
They have shown us that, from our interiority, we can grow. That, in this constant dialogue with Jesus, we find meaning in life and he invites us to welcome the other regardless of who he is. It is a love that makes us feel swollen, moved and sustained.
To be a student of Sacred Heart is a seal for life and a precious mission that was given to us when our parents chose this school for us. To love like the Sacred Heart is to love the different, the enemy, the difficult. It is a heart that sees light in the darkness, welcome in the hostile, joy in sadness. But thanks to the surrender of others, to feel loved and to feel capable of surrendering and living in Jesus every day, from our human imperfection, little by little we realize that He is present, that He accompanies us, that together with the Holy Spirit He illuminates our way at all times.
Without the school, without you (educators) who have taught us everything we are telling you today, we would not be the same women we are today. Catholic women who know how to see God in others, who thanks to the example of the Sacred Heart can go out to meet the other, always seeing others as an opportunity and not as a threat...
Thank you, dearest Sacred Heart, for having allowed us to become women who look and live from the Heart of Christ, a heart open and ready to give itself to the whole world..."
Staying silent for a moment as we welcome these words, and the following questions can help us share our prayer:
- What wells up in my heart as I hear this testimony?
- Do I feel hopeful in the face of youth?
- What would you like to put in the Heart of Jesus today?
After sharing, I would like to thank these spaces that help us to continue opting for youth and especially for vocations to the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Invite to finish with this video, also made by students of the Sacred Heart School Apoquindo with a song in which they won first place in a contest of Catholic voices in Santiago de Chile.
Jessie Muñoz Sepúlveda rscj
Province of Chile
