Dear friends,

As we prepare to celebrate the 160th anniversary of our founding on Christmas in 1845, when Fr. d’Alzon and five companions (one layman and four priests) began their life together as Assumptionist novices, I’ve been thinking about our novices in six different novitiates around the world and about you as well.  Without lay people like yourselves, very likely there would not have been a founding at all.

The General Council is just this morning finishing a three-week long meeting that has been very intense and very rich.  This explains why I have not written earlier.  During our session, we called six young Assumptionists to the priesthood and five others to the diaconate, and we admitted six brothers to final profession in our religious family.  We also spent time “forming” three “new” Provincials (from the provinces of France, Northern Europe and Spain).  But most of our time was spent thinking about how best to animate the Congregation in the years to come in light of the decisions taken at our recent General Chapter.  The results of our work will be published in summary form in a letter that all Assumptionists, including yourselves, will receive just after the new year begins.  It is entitled “Encountering God… and humankind”.

Rather than wait until that letter is published, I wanted already now to tell you how we plan to proceed with the implementation of the decisions that we made in May in response to the proposals of the lay participants at the Chapter.  I have asked Father Julio and one of the lay participants to meet within the next two months to prepare a set of proposals that the General Council will study, with the both of them, at their March meeting.  These proposals will be forwarded to the Major Superiors, at their annual meeting (to be held this year in the Netherlands), for their decision.  I am hoping to act on proposals regarding the Chapter’s main priorities:  formation for lay Assumptionists, specific initiatives to promote collaboration in the mission, and structures at the Provincial and international level to further our lay-religious alliance.  Very specifically, I hope that we have in place by the month of May a small lay-religious international commission that will be able to think about this alliance in an ongoing way and regularly generate specific proposals.

There is an old saying:  Rome wasn’t built in a day.  Isn’t that true?  It may have taken a long time to build, but Rome continues to be alive and well.  Our lay-religious alliance is being built up slowly, but we are convinced that it is one of the signs that the Spirit continues to sustain our life in the Assumption family and prepare us for the challenges of the Church in the 21st century.

Please be assured of my prayers for you and for your family during this Christmas season, when we celebrate a mystery so important for Assumptionists:  God made flesh, in our world, today, and in our hearts.  May He continue to sustain you, your loved ones, and all of our communities in the New Year to come.

Fraternally,

Richard E. Lamoureux, a.a., your brother in Rome
Christmas 2005