Thank you very much for everything!

Posted by Fr. Carlos Walker, IVE on June 09, 2014
Documents, Italy

8th May 2014, Solemnity of Our Lady of Luján

Your Eminence,

We are very grateful that you wanted to celebrate with us this holy Mass in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Lujan, the patroness of our Institutes as declared by the Holy See. It is an occasion that is very dear to all of us. She was precisely the one whom Father Buela, when he was still a seminarian, used to ask for the grace to be able to guide many vocations in his priestly life. Today, this is reality and we, her sons and daughters do not want to let this feast pass without manifesting our acknowledgment and gratitude. In addition, this year this feast coincides with both the recent canonization of John Paul II, “Father” of our religious family, and with the celebration of our 10th anniversary since the ecclesiastical approval of our Institutes.

Our constitutions (# 119-121) indicate that the priest, above all, should be a father, because when he is ordained he is granted the wonderful mission of generating children. The constitutions also state that this spiritual paternity should be achieved through the cross, prayer, apostolic zeal, and preaching. For each and all of these reasons, Pope John Paul II has been and continues to be a true father to our small religious family.

In effect, this great Pope has brought us to life through his preaching. Our founder was inspired in his magisterium in order to forge our specific purpose and charism. Our Constitutions contain more than a thousand quotations of his magisterium, making him the most cited author after the Second Vatican Council, so that our religious nourish their souls with his teachings, both for their personal lives and for the apostolic works of the Institute. Certainly there is no doubt that John Paul II is our father, since he generated us with his doctrine.

He has generated us through his prayer, which he constantly raised to heaven during the days of his pilgrimage in this world, through which he has given us such beautiful example, as well as through the prayers that, we trust, he must be offering, now more than ever, on our behalf in heaven.

Lastly, He has generated us through his prodigious and indefatigable apostolic zeal, which in our case, through the eternal and unfathomable designs of God’s Providence, many times was tied up to the mystery of the cross.

Your Eminence, you know perhaps better than anyone, of the personal care that his Holiness Saint John Paul II had for our small group. It will always be an honor for us that a Saint Pope, has worked in such a singular way for our small religious family in its beginnings, thus leaving him somehow forever associated to us. The paternity of our beloved Pope has truly manifested itself as a participation of the Paternity of God, and has become for us a visible image of God our Father.

Most Reverend Eminence, as we remember and appreciate the gestures and actions of his holiness Saint John Paul II, we are led to express our appreciation to you, who have been closely linked to our approval by the explicit request of Pope John Paul II.

We thank God for giving us today the opportunity of thanking you in public. Many thanks for everything, your Eminence! Our religious family will always remember how much you have done for us. We always pray especially for you, when we pray for our spiritual and material benefactors. Thank you very much for everything!

We also are very grateful to his Excellency Bishop Lino Fumagalli for being with us at this feast which is so important to us. It is a source of joy to have you with us on this day that is dedicated to our Patroness. Thank you very much your Excellency.

We also want to acknowledge our gratitude to his Excellency Bishop Andrea M. Erba, who approved our Institutes. He wanted to be here with us today but unfortunately he was unable to come. Without any doubts he joins us in his prayer.

 

Fr. Carlos Walker, IVE

General Superior 

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