Pre-Chapter in Montreal, 22-26 August 2022
In Montréal, from August 22nd to 26th 2022, we have celebrated our American Pre-chapter with leaders Maite Sanz de Pablo et Florence Mwamba Malunga and many sisters from Canada and the United States. Here are some extracts with the sisters’ reflections: “This moment of grace allows us to look together how have lived the orientations of the General Chapter 2017 and the orientations of our post-capitular Chapter: “Bearers of hope, listening to the voice of the Spirit, let’s move forward together towards the peripheries.” “GRATITUDE: … Finally, the real gift of gratitude is that the more we are grateful, the more present we become. This is our boundless wish for our gathering.” “LIVING SOME CHANGES OF SEASONS: The change of seasons has been characterized by the changes in our own being as persons, as we continue to grow in age. Ageing brings a lot of challenges to many of us.…
The Juniorat 2022-2023 “A Time of Grace”
From September 12, 2022, we started arriving in Rome and our sisters in the Generalate house warmly welcomed us with joy. On September 15, 2022, on the feast of our Lady of Sorrows, we officially began our Juniorate program. Our sisters Mapendo Annonciata and Maamalifar Poreku accompany us. Slowly as we start our journey of these 5 months, we have been blessed to visit some historical places of our Catholic faith like St. Peter’s Basilica and Assisi to walk in the footsteps of St. Francis. We were happy to join our senior sisters and brothers in this pilgrimage to Assisi. Indeed, we profited doubly. Besides living the experience of Assisi together, we also shared passed experiences. On September 21, 2022, the feast of St. Matthew, we had our opening mass celebrated by Fr. Olivier Soma (MAfr). The whole of this day was special for us, crowned by the opening…
Sharing the “Come and see” in Burundi
“Come and see” is an invitation that God launches to anyone who wants to know his plan of Love. In our community in Burundi, this summer 2022 we organized two missionary sessions for girls who feel attracted by our missionary vocation and who seek to know for what project God created them, and how they can engage in his life, to respond to the Will of God. From July 12 to 15, the session was for students studying at the second level, we call them “pre-finalists”, there were 4 girls, plus Evelyne, our young postulant who came from Congo for her leave and who is preparing to leave for Burkina Faso. From August 8 to 12, the missionary session was for girls who have finished high school and who have many questions about their future. There were 9 girls from different regions of Burundi. The sisters of the community,…
Missionary vocation camp in Deli, Chad
This month was marked by a missionary vocation camp where we welcomed 20 girls coming from different parishes of our diocese of Moundou and wishing to know our congregation. They are interested in a missionary and apostolic life. The session was from August 7 to 12. The themes were: “Ecological conversion with Jesus” and “What are you looking for?” Each of us participated in the session and gave our part according to the proposed themes. In these two themes, we find that what marked the young people is that ecology is a question of loving and taking care of creation, starting with oneself. And for the second theme, vocation is to live a happy life with others and for others. We had the joy of sharing with them about our congregation: charism, spirituality and why we were founded by Cardinal Lavigerie. After that we had a day of sending on…
The Earth is for all… be happy!
Each year in Nouakchott, the “Maison du Quartier” organises a summer camp for 3 weeks. This year’s theme was: “The Earth is for all… be happy! “. This camp aims to help children improve their knowledge by doing several activities with them. This year, we were lucky enough to experience this event because in previous years, it had been cancelled due to Covid 19. The “Maison du Quartier” committee, in collaboration with our community, organised activities that could help these children. There were volunteers who offered to give the children various activities such as: embroidery, crochet, computers, decorating bottles, singing and patchwork. Everyone contributed where they could. We welcomed about thirty children and we put them in groups so that they could participate in all the activities in turn. Through these activities, we taught the children to save nature by recovering and using everything that had to be thrown away,…
2022 Season of Creation Prayer
Creator of All, From your communion of love your Word went forth to create a symphony of life that sings your praise. By your Holy Wisdom you made the Earth to bring forth a diversity of creatures who praise you in their being. You called human beings to till and keep your garden. But we turn in on ourselves and away from our co-creatures. We fail to listen to the cries of the poor and the needs of the most vulnerable. We silence the voices of those who hold the traditions that teach us to care for the Earth. We close our ears to your creative, reconciling and sustaining Word that calls to us through the Scriptures. Creation cries out as forests crackle, and animals alike flee the fires of injustice that we have lit by our unwillingness to listen. In this Season of Creation, we…
A grandmother’s faith
It was June 26, the MSOLA community, like all the parishioners of Saint Jean-Baptiste de Sceaux, was invited to the big annual end-of-year party. It was for Agnès Nouyrigat, the occasion of a beautiful meeting. Our church being too small to contain all the parishioners, a large tent was erected by municipal employees in the garden of the Menagerie, which allowed everyone to participate in the Eucharistic celebration. The choir, accompanied by several instruments was able to motivate the assembly, with well-chosen and catchy songs. The celebration ended with the blessing of the families. I must say that this gesture for the families particularly moved me. It was touching to see coming before the priest: fathers, mothers and children, several kneeling to receive the blessing, then putting into a basket a prayer intention written by the family. An aperitif taken on the spot, still under the tent, allowed people to…
A Look at the Women of Africa
After spending many years in West Africa, and living in several communities in France, Marie-Vincente Brouca is now at the St Charles Retirement Home in Verrières-le-Buisson. With ever sparkling eyes, she tells us about her missionary life in Mali and Burkina Faso. As soon as I arrived in Bamako, I marvelled at the beauty of the Malian women! In the years that followed, I had the chance to work with them, in a Social Center teaching French and embroidery. In fact, they taught me much more than I knew myself. Among them were Muslim women, much freer than in North Africa and some Christian women. Then I was sent to an African Congregation to train young women in religious life. There, although they only had a few rudiments of French, I saw that they knew how to live and express themselves, not to mention their faith which amazed me. Then…
PROSAMI- student’s acknowledgements
In 2010 when PROSAMI launched its midwifery training program with the initial group of fourteen Congolese nurses, The congregation of The Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Africa (MSOLA) believed in our mission, stepped in, and became one of our top donors, giving annually significant amount of money to support our activities. We can train more midwives, equipping them with skills to provide safe, higher standard quality care to communities in a low resource setting and thus contributing to the reduction of maternal and infant mortality rate in the DRC. The student midwives from the current group on training expressed their gratitude to you for your support, acknowledging the huge difference you contributed to their professional lives. Kindly find their words of appreciation. Agnes Kanyanya PROSAMI, Founder & Training Coordinator