R. Lamoureux, a.a. Superior General

Our “reality” today

It might seem that the glorious period of the Assumptionist mission in the East has passed.  Communism had a role to play in that decline, although we can think of other reasons as well.  What has been called a “mobilizing myth” is no longer mobilizing many religious to give their lives for the mission in the East.  A number of brothers and sisters constitute a faithful remnant still at work in the Orient, now more focused on the immediate and very varied needs of the local populations:  parish ministry, social works, catechesis, vocation ministry, school chaplaincies, work among immigrants.  We have communities in Romania, Bulgaria, Istanbul, Jerusalem, Moscow and Athens.  We retain some contact with the Eastern Churches in these places, as well as with the Muslim population in Istanbul.  Whatever mission the Lord entrusts to us today in the East, it will be different the “glorious” past, and it will be modest, but how might it still remain faithful to the vision that Father d’Alzon had almost a century and a half ago?