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ALL OF US, BROTHERS AND SISTERS
Welcoming difference Travelling together
In his encyclical “Fratelli Tutti”, Pope Francis invites us to experience fraternity.
A few quick headlines …
- In community, the many small, daily good turns speak of the importance we give to each person;
the thoughtfulness that gives support to fragility .... prayer for the world and with the world. - Among neighbours, taking the trouble to bring the Sunday newsletter, even if we are
not always well received ... Keeping to this visit every week consolidates fraternity.
We also witness signs of fraternity when elderly people continue to visit others to
suggest a game or a walk, or to establish a relationship. - In the parish: During Lent, we were invited in the diocese to "let ourselves be deeply
rooted in the Gospel" by reading the Gospel of Mark personally and in groups. The people
who responded to our proposal for a weekly meeting appreciated the richness of sharing
with its openness to the newness of the Gospel. They expressed the desire to continue
this prayerful reading.
With the catechism children, we used to organize a bowl of rice to help organisations that support the poor. This year the pandemic has shaken everything up, but we did not want to drop this goodwill action. Thanks to the crisis, we dared to do something new. After the Sunday Masses, we sold sachets of rice, apples and chocolates offered by our benefactors. The parishioners and visitors were very generous in this Lenten action!
The money raised goes to the “Vanille-Fraise” Association which works to advance research into Sturge-Weber Syndrome, a disease whose origin we do not know and that affects the meninges, eyes, skin…
In the name of the Gospel, together let us allow our old ways to be disrupted and let us dare to find new ways to serve, to be close, to listen, to help one another and to share. The pandemic is an invitation to live in a new and creative way. Achieving this involves being serene and having the strength to continue to move forward and to invent new ways of living a fraternal life. Whether this is face-to-face or socially distanced, it is vital!
- At the nursing home for the elderly: Two lay residents and one of our resident Sisters have been asked to deliver mail around the house ... a regular, discreet service that they do generously.
Currently we have two prayer times per week. If we can, we meet in the chapel, with an average of 12 people. Lay people and Sisters are happy to pray together ... It is a privileged, important time, where everyone experiences a personal and community encounter with God, the God who loves and waits for us.
Our prayer of thanksgiving, praise, supplication embraces the world and the life of our nursing home and we are attentive to the richness of liturgical seasons.
After the challenges of the pandemic, are these realities "in fraternal colours" not "little flowers of resurrection"?