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WHO WE ARE
The Marian
Community of Reconciliation
(MCR) is a community of consecrated laywomen that assume in
our lives the commitments of obedience, celibacy and detachment
from temporal goods in order to be fully available for the apostolate.
We, the Fraternas – as the members of the MCR are called
- desire to announce with our lives the Lord Jesus as the answer
for the human being. Looking to Holy Mary, we assume the mission
of living, like Her, an authentic spiritual motherhood. |
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The Fraterna
Cecilia Collazos, General Coordinator
of the Marian Community of the
Reconciliation |
Our History
The
Community was founded in the Archdiocese of Lima-Peru by Luis
Fernando Figari on March 25th, feast of the Annunciation-Incarnation.
It was approved by the then Archbishop of Lima and Primate of
Peru, Most Reverend Augusto Vargas Alzamora, and later confirmed
by Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani, the current Archbishop of Lima
and Primate of Peru. Through the
blessings of the Lord, our communities are spreading throughout
the world. We are presently serving in several dioceses of
South America (Peru, Chile, Colombia and Ecuador); United
States (Colorado, Texas and Connecticut) and Europe (Italy
and England). Shortly a new community will begin in the Archdiocese
of Sydney, Australia.
Our history actually dates back to 1975,
when Luis Fernando Figari initially founded the Association
of Immaculate Mary, aimed at a group of young women that wanted
to live their faith coherently, by welcoming the call of God
to holiness and by committing themselves to the apostolate.
Some of the young women of the Association
of Immaculate Mary felt a calling from God to consecrate their
lives to Him through a full apostolic availability. They were
the ones who began a life in common, living the Sodalit Spirituality,
maturing their specific vocation, until some years later the
Marian Community of Reconciliation was born. Both of these
feminine associations, together with the Sodalitium Christianae
Vitae, the Servants of the Plan of God, and the Christian
Life Movement form the Sodalit
Family. |
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Bishop
William E. Lori with the Members
of the Marian
Community of the Reconciliation
in Connecticut
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| The
Community in the Diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut
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Our Community in the
Diocese
of Bridgeport, Connecticut, was founded in November
11th 2005, following the invitation of the Bishop, Most Reverend
William E. Lori. He asked the four sisters who established
the first community to participate actively in the evangelization,
catecheses and apostolate to the youth in Fairfield County.
Two of the sisters are heading the Office for Pastoral Services at the Catholic Center, whiles
another sister works with the youth as Campus Minister and
teacher at St.
Joseph High School.
The diocese of Bridgeport comprises all of Fairfield County,
serving a total Catholic Population of over 410,000 registered
parishioners, amounting to 43.8% of the total population of
the county. There are 87 parishes, 39 Catholic Schools and
offers through Catholic Charities, extensive support services
to the needy in the dioceses.
News in the Diocese of Bridgeport about
the Fraternas, click
here
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| Sodalit Spirituality
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| Amidst the multiple charisms that
the Holy Spirit bestows on the Church, the Marian Community
of Reconciliation is blessed with its own spirituality and style:
the Sodalit Spirituality. Pope John Paul II confirmed this spirituality
as a valid path towards holiness. One
of the essential characteristics of our spirituality is to
live an intense filial love to Holy Mary. We, the sisters
of the MCR, live the spirituality of Mary and as her daughters
we want to cooperate in Her mission of bringing her children
towards the Lord Jesus.
We are aware that human strengths alone
cannot accomplish this overwhelming task, therefore we trust
that by actively cooperating with grace, the light and the
drive to carry out this mission will be given by God.
Conscious of the ruptures present
in the life of human beings and the culture, we take on as
a priority in our lives the commitment of living and announcing,
wherever we are, the Reconciliation which comes from the Lord
Jesus. With a humble spirit, our mission is to serve and love
the Church intensely. |
Some of the characteristics of the Sodalit Spirituality are:
Centrality of the
mystery of the Holy Trinity
Created to the image and likeness of God, we are called to
participate in the Trinitarian communion of love as our furthermost
aim in life. Concretely, through our community lives we try
to reflect this Divine Communion of Love.
In our daily lives we are continuously educated in living
a freer and more generous love, by sharing with our sisters
our calling, mission, friendship and love of the Lord.
Incarnational
Our approach to the world is incarnational, following the
dynamism that Jesus Christ taught us. Even if we do not belong
to the world, we are in the world, and in a certain sense
we share a creational solidarity. The betterment of
humanity is not alien to the Plan of God. We emphasize the
truth that only in the mystery of the Lord Jesus does the
mystery of man take on light and make his supreme calling
clear. (Cf. GS 22)
Marian-Christ-centered:
“Through Christ to Mary and through Mary more fully
to the Lord Jesus”
Christ is our life. We believe He is the Word of God conceived
by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, for our Reconciliation.
Following the path of Faith we hear Him from high on the Cross
showing us the direction we must follow to reach Him. He tells
us: «Behold thy mother.» (Jn 19: 27) He generously
gives us His Mother as our Mother, and invites us to be Her
children, to be Mary’s true daughters. Filial love to
Mary is the key to reach the Sacred Heart of the Lord Jesus,
and let ourselves be configured to Him. It is Jesus who invites
us to enter the affective school of Mary. Living as Her daughters,
getting to know and love Her, we find that in Her Immaculate
Heart everything takes us back to Jesus the Lord.
Ecclesial
We express our ecclesiality as daughters of the Church by
faithfully accepting the integrity of faith and theguidance
of the Magisterium. With joy we serve its evangelizing mission
and collaborate promptly with its Shepherds.
Second Vatican
Council
Conscious of the importance that the Second Vatican Council
has had for the Church and the world in this new millennium,
we strive to be faithful so that the lights that irradiate
from this Council may help dissipate the darkness
that threatens mankind. The world is constantly under the
siege of the "culture of death”, secularism and
functional agnosticism. Living and spreading the authentic
message of the Council is an important aspect of our
pursuit to holiness. We strongly experience its influence
in determining the criteria through which we view the world,
focusing on the evangelization task that must be carried out.
Calling to holiness
in our daily life
We want to answer to the universal call to holiness clearly
stated in the II Vatican Council that comes from the incorporation
to the Lord Jesus through Baptism in the Church. We are all
called to be saints in our everyday life,
making extraordinary every ordinary moment. Our calling as
disciples is to fulfill God’s Plan by doing our best
effort, using all the powers within us and the talents and
skills we posses according to our possibilities and circumstances.
We are called to change the world, to transform it into the
civilization of love and we know that only saints will be
able to do it!
Integral living
of the faith
Responding to all the dimensions of the human being, we try
to live our faith as an integral gift that enlightens our
mind, changes our heart and is expressed in our action.
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