14 September

Sep 14, 2018 | Claret mit dir

*139.- “When an institute or convent does not have spirit, it is dead; it will not listen to voices or dispositions, however wise, holy and charitable they may be.”
Notas sobre el Concilio Vaticano I, en AEC p. 578

ONLY THE SPIRIT GIVES LIFE

For Claret it is the spirit that keeps us on course. It is one’s spirit that lets us be upright before difficulties and challenges. It is in the small things where consistency of this spirit is tested.
There have been many attempts at reform within the Christian and religious life but only those that have come after listening closely to the Spirit have been successful. It must never be forgotten that ‘reform’ is to recover the lost form. They say ‘to be on form’, ‘recover form’, this is the work of a spirit that knows how to listen to the Spirit. Normally what the Spirit does is to soften the heart of man to gain in sensibility.
The II Vatican Council invited all the orders and religious congregations to return to the spirit of their Founder. It does not mean to return to that era nor to the customs and models of that time but rather to the ‘spirit’. This is not easy. That is why Claret said, ‘it is easier to found new than to reform’. Every true reform demands study and discernment. With study you can overcome the impoverishment of ideas that the Spirit offers us through those who investigate reality in its historical evolution the development of thought. With discernment we place into the hands of others our motions to help us avoid giving too simple a solution to the new challenges that arise but that are timely.
The great obstacle to the necessary renewal, ours and that of those around us, is the tendency to passivity that make us throw out many of the motions for which we have received the Spirit. Claret concludes, ‘When man is faithful to his vocation and responds with a great force of will, he can do a great deal’.

Kategorien

Archiv

21 December

“I never tired of being in church before the image of Our Lady of the Rosary, and I talked and prayed so trustingly that I was quite sure the Blessed Virgin heard me. I used to imagine a sort of wire running from the image in front of me to its heavenly original....

20 December

“If something pains or disturbs you, suffer it patiently thinking that the Lord has placed it so. If you are able to give alms, do it for the love of God, thinking of the neighbours and particularly in the poor who are the image of Jesus. No day should pass without...

19 December

“With regard to the slanders unleashed against me, I am not sad; I am very happy in the Lord” Carta a D. José Caixal, 10 de marzo de 1865, en EC II, p. 864 FORTITUDE IN THE FACE OF ADVERSITY “Fortunate are you, when people insult you...., because you are my disciples”...

claretian martyrs icon
Clotet Year - Año Clotet
global citizen

Documents – Documentos