A journey of holiness in daily life

Rome (Italy). In a video message, the Superior General of the FMA Institute, Mother Chiara Cazzuola,  presents the book “The Constitutions of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians: a journey of holiness in daily life”:

Dearest Sisters,

I present to you with joy this book, the result of a careful work done with great love and sense of belonging, accompanied by prayer and thought as a necessary contribution to revive fidelity to our Rule of life.

After a long journey of study and shared work, the Practical Commentary has been published in these days, not surprisingly in the first year of the triennium in preparation for the 150^th anniversary of the first missionary departure of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (2024-2027).

The  vocational and missionary fecundity of the Institute passes through the assimilation of the text of the Constitutions, a gift of Don Bosco and Mary Domenica Mazzarello to each one of us. More than a collection of laws to be observed, they are for us the mediation of a charismatic project, a “plan of life” shaped by the Gospel.

The Constitutions are “the pact of our covenant with God,” the sure guide to holiness.

Mother Mazzarello affirms this in many letters, both to the novices and to the Sisters. She is convinced that the Constitutions are the way of daily holiness and, in her realism, she writes to the novice Lorenzina Natale, “Think often that our holy Rule is the sure guide that will lead us to Heaven; be exact in its observance” (L 67,6). She reminds Sister Jacinta Olivieri to practice  “all the virtues that our Holy Rule asks of us” (L 59,2). The Rules are, therefore, a privileged evangelical way of meeting with Christ and of realizing a faithful following to His call.

This Practical Commentary is a concrete means that can help us to make our existence and our mission generative of life in the heart of the Church and the world. The need to share firm points about our Rule of life has always been felt in the Institute, but it is especially so today. In fact, there are two risks regarding the text of the Constitutions: formal compliance and neglect caused by relativism and superficiality. Living the Constitutions is not a tribute to pay, nor a burden to bear with difficulty, but an act of fidelity and gratitude to God who, calling us to follow Jesus more closely, has made with us a covenant of love that is being realized, little by little, along the path of our life and mission.

Generations of Daughters of Mary Help of Christians have expressed their daily fidelity to Jesus, the community, and the educative mission, letting themselves be guided by our Rule of life. It is, in fact, a privileged evangelical way, a sure way to reach the perfection of charity, the ultimate goal of every consecrated life.

Full text

The video is available with subtitles in Italian, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish(from the YouTube settings).