Feast of Baroda Carmelite monastery: "Even non-Christians find God"
Mumbai (AsiaNews) - The Discalced Carmelite nuns in the diocese of Baroda (in the Indian state of Gujarat) yesterday celebrated the 32nd anniversary of the founding of the monastery Prem Jyot (Light of Love), the feast day of Our Lady of Sorrows.
The monastery was opened September 15, 1983 by Card. Agostino Cacciavillan, Apostolic Nuncio, the presence of Msgr. Salvador Ignatius D'Souza, late Bishop of Baroda, and mother Elisabeth, prioress of the Carmelite monastery in Mumbai. Sister Marie Gemma OCD, Prioress of Prem Jyot, told AsiaNews: "[Here we can] live our contemplative life and even non-Christians are welcome and find God”.
The convent was founded on the impulse of Mgr. D'Souza, the first bishop of the Diocese of Baroda, who asked the nuns to create a monastery to "serve the Church and its people through a life dedicated to prayer." At first there were only eight Carmelite sisters and the structure was built by the Spanish Fr. Carsi sj to capture sunlight (hence the name). "In this way - says Sister Gemma - the monastery is a place of light, where everyone can meet the love of Christ.
"The prioress reports that the Carmelites have good ties with non-Christians of the place, attending the monastery and ask the sisters to intercede for them through prayer. "They stop in our chapel, immersed in the beauty and silence of contemplation," she reports. Local doctors - not Christians - also offer free medical care to all the sisters.
On September 12 the whole community gathered to celebrate the feast of the Holy Name of Mary, and repeated the name of Our Lady to 1,000 times. "This kind of worship - explains Sister Gemma - originated with the French Carmelite sisters and is repeated every year. We Carmelite pray for the beloved Holy Father, Pope Francis, for his intentions and for the universal Church, in India and Asia. The Sisters also pray individually and for the needs of the local people”.
The nun says that the ritual of repeating the name of Mary up to 1000 times "brings immense joy and brings us closer to Mary. She is Mother, and Sister Regina. " The same veneration was also implemented during the celebrations of the 500th anniversary of the birth of St. Teresa of Avila. According to the mother superior, the ritual at that time had an even more intense meaning, because in the writings of the saint there is a great devotion to the Mother of Christ.
In the doctrine of St. Therese, "there is a deep conviction that the mysteries of the humanity of Christ and the Virgin Mary are part of the mystical experience of those who strive for perfection. Among the characteristic values of the Virgin which Saint Teresa proposed there is one above all: Mary is the first Christian disciple of God, who followed Christ even at the foot of the cross. Mary is the model of total adherence to the humanity of Jesus and communion with him in his mysteries, in a way that becomes a model of contemplation based on the sacred humanity ".
In the writings of St. Teresa of Jesus, we read: "It is important to know that our Lord is pleased with every service rendered to his mother and great is his grace. I found the favor of Our Lady in everything I asked her for, and she finally drew me to herself.
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05/04/2018 10:13
