We continue our pilgrimage with the same attitude and the same goal

Fr. José María García. Dear Friends,
Filled with great gratitude for all the life and all the expectations that have been generated around the jubilee of our international Family, and at this moment when my contribution to our common pilgrimage has to change, I want to turn to you all via our media – our international page and our Jubilee Newsletter.

You have received the news that I have to give up my responsibility as leader of Team 2014 for health reasons. When I think back on the three years since the Conference 2014, when our Family experienced a Cenacle situation, I feel greatly enriched by the fact that at many places, in communities and individuals, new life has broken through in the strength of the “grace of 2014”, and given a concrete form to the “steps along our pilgrim way”. I thank all of you from my heart – my closest collaborators as well as those people somewhere in the world who have decided generously and enthusiastically to commit themselves to live the current of life and grace of the covenant of love, which moves our Family into its second century. There are countless genuine testimonies of love in the covenant, for which we must thank. It is a love that makes our faith in the loyalty of the MTA in the shrine both concrete and effective, as well as our commitment to the Church and society, which God the Father has entrusted to us. Thank you, because this strengthened me each day and gave me the motivation for the work I was able to do in our original Schoenstatt.

I thank the Blessed Mother for her faithfulness to the covenant of love. She relies on us despite our weaknesses, or even just because, like her, we experience that we are small in the face of our mission. That is the seal set on a work of God. Since we know and experience that we never live at the heights of the mission entrusted to us, and never will, we accept each day anew and consecrate to her what we have, what we are able to do, what we do, and what remains to be done. She is the one who brings about great things through her covenant partners. She doesn’t want any other covenant partners than us. She counts on us as people and as a Family, just as we are, who join her in singing humbly: “My spirit rejoices in God, my Saviour, for he has looked upon the lowliness … of his Schoenstatt. … The Almighty has done great things for me.”

If there is one thing that has made a profound impression on me in the time of grace of Conference 2014 and the triennium of preparation for the jubilee, it is the fact that we have a mission. We don’t need to justify ourselves or hide our mission when we offer it to the Church and the people of our times – precisely in this attitude of the Magnificat.

I thank our Father and Founder, because love for him has awakened so much life in his children, who thus pass on his priestly love for the Church and world, and because his mission and his educational wisdom become credible and effective in the selfless commitment and missionary activity of his children.

In the covenant with many, and through the contribution of many, the Blessed Mother has brought about great things in our Family in this time of the triennium. She works, she tests and gives a covenant culture. For the rest of our pilgrimage we have a secure and strong foundation. 2014 continues. In the strength of the currents of life in our international Family I invite you to shape the spirituality of the covenant of love with every step on our pilgrim way, in the way in which the Lord counts on us.

I am now continuing my pilgrimage in a different way, but with the same attitude and with the same goal. In this spirit and in deep union with you all, you can count on my contribution, my prayers and my priestly blessing.

God willing, we will meet again in October 2014 in Schoenstatt and Rome.

Fr. José María García

See also: With every step on our pilgrim way