Message of the CIVCSVA to the X General Chapter - Part I

On the occasion of the X General Chapter of the Secular Franciscan Order the Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life wishes, through this message, to address all you participants of the Chapter and, through you, all of the adherents to the great worldwide Fraternity of Secular Franciscans. We make ours the greeting of St. Francis, "The Lord give you Peace", with particular reference to all you Chapter Members gathered from different parts of the world, to the Minister General, Mrs. Emanuela De Nunzio, to the Father General Assistants and to the entire outgoing International Council.

The General Chapter you are celebrating is the first of the new millennium. Such historic circumstances place you in the need to seek a response to the invitation of Christ, repeated by the Holy Father John Paul II, to set sail. This Office, which in assisting the Supreme Pontiff extends his jurisdiction over the Third Orders, wishes, with the present message, to propose to you, Chapter Brothers and Sisters and all the Secular Franciscans of the world, a reflection on the pastoral orientations of the Holy Father to the Church at the beginning of the new millennium.

The present General Chapter has a particular importance given the fact that, after the conclusion of the legislative journey that culminated in the year of the Great Jubilee, this Congregation approved in a definitive way the General Constitutions, by which you are now called to commit yourselves to and intensify your presence as Secular Franciscans in the life of the Church and of Society.

This General Chapter of the SFO, like a sentinel awaiting the dawn, strong in faith and hope, is called on to awaken new hope in the whole Order, to re-launch the desire "to observe the Gospel by following the example of St. Francis of Assisi" (SFO Rule 4), to open wide the horizons of dialogue and mission, "proclaiming Christ by your life and words" (SFO Rule 6) and "trusting in the presence of the divine seed in everyone" (SFO Rule 19).

It is necessary to remember the need for constant reference to your Rule, because in it and in the General Constitutions "there is provided a map for the whole journey of discipleship, in accordance with a specific charism confirmed by the Church" (VC, 37) in the footprints of St. Francis of Assisi, who translated the Gospel into a concrete Forma of Life, making it for each Secular Franciscan, "the point of reference of daily experience, on the basis of a specific vocation and by a precise identity" (Promulgation of the SFO General Constitutions).

In the recent Instruction "Starting Afresh From Christ" (SAFC), which the Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life addressed to the persons of the consecrated life for a new commitment in the third millennium, there are found some reflections that can also be applied to your Fraternity, a vital secular expression of the great Franciscan Family. To you also, Sisters and Brothers of the Secular Franciscan Order, there is repeated the appeal: "We must therefore allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit to a constantly renewed discovery of God and of his Word, to a burning love for God and for humanity and to a new understanding of the charism which has been given. It calls for a concentration on an intense spirituality in the strongest sense of the word, that is, life according to the Spirit" (SAFC 20).

Indeed the Secular Franciscan Order today also "needs a spiritual rebirth which will help to concretely bring about the spiritual and evangelical meaning of baptismal consecration and of its new and special consecration" (ibid.), renewed and reaffirmed with profession in the SFO. It is necessary to adhere evermore to Christ, "the gift of the Father's love, the way to him, the truth into which the Holy Spirit leads us, and the life which he has come to give abundantly" (SFO Rule 4) in order to take up a course of conversion and renewal with vigour once again. You can and must start afresh from Christ because He himself, first of all, came to meet you and he accompanies you on the journey. "Starting afresh from Christ means once again finding one's first love, the inspiring spark which first gave rise to the following. The primacy of love is his. The following is only a response in love to the love of God " (SAFC 22), lived in fraternal communion in the bosom of the Church, the community of love (cf. SFO Rule 22).

Sanctity, to which your Rule spurs you, "is the fruit of the encounter with him in the many presences in which we can discover his face as the Son of God, a suffering face and at the same time the face of the Risen One (SAFC 23), with the aim of recognising him in the gaze of faith, in familiarity with the Word of God, with the sacramental life, with prayer and above all with the exercise of charity. Your General Constitutions enjoin on you to "discover the presence of the Father in your own heart, in nature and in the history of humanity in which His plan of salvation is fulfilled" (SFO Gen Cons 12.3). The contemplation of such a mystery will render you ready to collaborate in this design of love.