IO/MLC logo
GIFTS AND TASKS 
International Organization of MLC:
Region of North America, Asia
Ireland and Australia
March , 2007
In This Issue
Quebec, Tunisia, Paris
News from India
REDS
5th MLC Document
Online Courses
Next Issue
Quick Links
Daffodils"We are in the season when everything should help us raise our hearts to God and provide us with topics of reflection. First: the plants, the trees, everything is reborn, and should we alone be unchanged! Let us be reborn in Jesus Christ. 'Easter is here! Let us be worthy of rising again with him, to start a new life." (3.3) Adele de Batz de Trenquell�on 
 
Dear friends,
 
As I finish writing this issue of Gifts and Tasks, I'm filled with wonder at how many miles it will travel at the click of a button. Is it spring where you are, or is autumn just beginning? Do you still have snow, or are leaves sprouting and cherry blossoms in bloom? How will Easter be celebrated in your part of our world? I pray that it will be a blessed time of rebirth and new life for all of us. 
 
May Easter joy and peace be yours,
 
Isabella
Quebec Lay Marianists Visit Tunisia and Paris
Submitted by Richard Thibault, MLC Quebec.
 
Richard Thibault and Tunisia SM
 
from left: Bro. Andr� Brissinger, SM, Richard Thibault, Bro. Morand Foechterl�,SM  and
Fr. Mangani, a retired diocesan priest living community with the Brothers.
 

Marie-Paule and I have just arrived from a trip to Tunisia and Paris and we had a wonderful time. We met the Marianist community from Tunis and spent all day Sunday with them celebrating mass at the cathedral, having lunch and visting the country side of Tunis in the afternoon. What a testimony of community life for these four men in a school of 1,000 students, all Muslims. When we asked them what was their mission in a country where no religion other than the official one can be taught, their answer was: we simply are!

 
Tunisia Cathedral
In Bro. Andr�,'s words, "Sometimes we have the impression of being worthless in this country where proselytism is strictly forbidden. We are here simply by our presence, our work, our prayers, and by our example. We are trying to be witnesses to Jesus, and to show, without saying it, that we can live as Christians in a Muslim world, practising charity and finally to provoke a reaction like the Jews in Jesus' time were saying: 'See how they love each other.' It may seem pretentious what I am saying, but we try to live it as much as possible."
 
 
 
 
Thibault_Gorgette
 
(Fr�d�ric and Mary Gorgette with Marie-Paule and Richard Thibault)
 
Another Marianist connection was made during our short stay in Paris. Marie-Paule and I were warmly welcomed by Mary and Fr�d�ric Gorgette and their three young sons. What a wonderful testimony from a young couple and their involvement in their parish with other couples their age. We shared our own project of organizing a parish week-end with the help of our Marianist Center in Quebec. We are aiming at the many people who have taken their distance from the Church.
 
 
 
District of India Newsletter
 
Madonna from India
 

Click below for the latest news from India

 
 
 
 

 

New REDS Web-Site
 
REDS Study Center
The primary objective of REDS (Ragpickers Education & Development Scheme) is to enable uneducated and waste picking children from the streets of Bangalore and Ranchi. REDS seeks to enlighten the underprivileged with an intervention process aimed at holistic development, ensuring successful integration and participation in the mainstream of society. (Mission of REDS)
 

Ms. Colleen McCarthy, 

a long time REDS volunteer at Deepahalli, has produced a website for REDS. It includes the latest newsletters, photos, program descriptions and ways to donate to this wonderful project. Click here to visit the website:  REDS.
5th MLC DocumentIO/MLC logo
Ana Blazquez UbachA writing team from Spain is being formed to begin work on our 5th International MLC Document,  "Marianist Lay Communities in the Church and in the World." Our previous documents on Identity, Mission, Community and Mary have explored the gift of our Marianist spirituality. This new document will explore the task of sharing this gift in our time.
 
As in the past, the writing team will guide the preparatory and foundational work for the document, collecting contributions and suggestions from all our members around the world. The draft document will then be voted on and ratified at the 5th International Meeting of MLC in 2009.
 
We thank Ana Blazquez Ubach, MLC Responsible for Europe, and our sisters and brothers in Spain for accepting this task. Our prayers and support go with them!
 
(A note - the International Team is presently finalizing the location for the 5th International Meeting. An announcement will be coming soon.) 
   
Virtual Learning Community Courses
April 15 - May 19, 2007
 
VLCFF logo
Marianist Studies: Social Justice  NEW COURSE!

Blessed William Joseph Chaminade faced a church and social order that had been torn apart during the French Revolution, fashioned a vision for rebuilding both the church and French society. Chaminade challenged his followers to "think big" in defining their mission. This course will explore his vision for social change. What were the structures he developed; the methods he employed. This course will also ask participants to consider ways they can be involved in promoting changes which will build a more authentic and credible church community and social order today. They will be challenged to integrate the insights of Father Chaminade with the realities of modern life in envisioning a Marianist approach to changing our world.

(Jim Vogt, Facilitator)

 
Marianist Studies: Prayer and the Marianist Journey

Father Chaminade asks his followers to devote an hour each day to prayer (perhaps in two or three shorter periods). Each week this course will explore various "methods" or practices of prayer, both individual and group prayer, and collectively reflect on the journey.

Father Chaminade wrote, "Prayer is to be kept with the discretion of a great love." Because many insights will be personal, you will be encouraged to keep a prayer journal. The Spirit of God is always at work, everywhere-including in our own hearts.
 
(Isabella Moyer, Facilitator)
 
Marianist Studies: Founders
 
On September 3, 2000, Father William Joseph Chaminade was beatified. Pope John Paul II, in his remarks at St. Peter's Square, commented on how Father Chaminade gave the Church a "new way to bear witness to the faith." Also, on that day, Father David Fleming, SM, Superior General of the Society of Mary, reminded the Marianist Family of how Father Chaminade "understood the need to renew institutional structures of the Church, but, above all, to enhance the attractive force of the gospel in the life of ordinary people. He thought that all could live a style of Christian community modeled on the first community of Jerusalem, with 'one heart and one soul'"
 
(Sue Vogt, Facilitator)
 
Register online from now until April 11, 2007.

For more information contact Patti Gehred, VLC Coordinator (NACMS) at [email protected]

 
 
Next Issue of Gifts and Tasks

We need local and national stories, reflections, and photos for Gifts and Tasks! Please send submissions and ideas for next month's issue to [email protected] by April 20th.

And kindly forward this issue to contact persons within your country to help with its distribution. If anyone would like to be added to the subscription list, please send email addresses to [email protected]. Thank you!