Mexico. As every morning, we thanked God for the life and the day we begin. The Morning Prayer today was centred on the commandment of love and mercy in the light of the reality of Haiti. It is striking to observe the lack of opportunities of the people, the rejection of those who have the money to do works there; extreme poverty reaches situations so detestable that people must eat mud biscuits to quench their hunger. O Lord, arouse in us solidarity and may we not remain indifferent in our comfort! The first work session was centred on the revision of the report of the executive secretariat where the commended and realised task was clearly expressed as well as the difficulties that prevented the fulfilment of some directives. In a plenary session many doubts were dispelled and points were proposed to be discussed in order to make the respective decisions. The morning ended with a warm applause to the good work done by Fr. Carlos Julio Rozo, executive secretary, Fr. Marco Mendes, vice-president and Fr. Agustín Monroy, president in this period that comes to an end.

As we shared our lunch, names began to be whispered and persons to be looked at, that could render their service of animation in CICLA. It is true that all played hard to get… with some smiles…

In the afternoon we started to tackle and programme tasks and analyze projects. The vocational ministry had its privileged space and two encounters were decided, one by zones and another at the level of CICLA, from the viewpoint of the pedagogy of accompaniment, of the agents and of the shared mission. On the proposal of a congress of Claretian spirituality with participation of the missionaries in formation and the formators of the continent, although the proposal is good, it was considered non-viable in economic terms and because of the rhythm of times in the different formative houses. The proposal was modified toward the realization of joint activities, or video-conferences, or internal works that will be shared later in the encounters of formandi and formators already programmed by CICLA.

The educative ministry also had its space and the continuation of the encounters of Claretian educators that are being successfully held was considered opportune. The proposed theme is: “The missionary options of the Claretian educative centre”. And it was resolved to promote some common project. Lastly we used the time to share and invite all to celebrate the 100 years of Claretian missionary presence in Uruguay this year and in Peru and Colombia next year so that we may revive the memory and the missionary passion of our first brothers. At the end of this session, the papers of the survey for the election of the new board of directors of CICLA were distributed.

With this we came to the end of the day that was closed with the Eucharist, centred on the missionary fervour of the apostles and on the centrality of love in all that we do.