Apostolic religious life
9. The West has also known, down the centuries, a variety of
other expressions of religious life, in which countless persons, renouncing the
world, have consecrated themselves to God through the public profession of the
evangelical counsels in accordance with a specific charism and in a stable form
of common life,for the sake of carrying out different forms of apostolic
service to the People of God. Thus there arose the different families of Canons
Regular, the Mendicant Orders, the Clerics Regular and in general the Religious Congregations of men and women devoted to apostolic and missionary activity and
to the many different works inspired by Christian charity.
This is a splendid and varied testimony, reflecting the
multiplicity of gifts bestowed by God on founders and foundresses who, in
openness to the working of the Holy Spirit, successfully interpreted the signs
of the times and responded wisely to new needs. Following in their footsteps,
many other people have sought by word and deed to embody the Gospel in their
own lives, bringing anew to their own times the living presence of Jesus, the
Consecrated One par excellence, the One sent by the Father. In every
age consecrated men and women must continue to be images of Christ the Lord,
fostering through prayer a profound communion of mind with him (cf. Phil 2:5-11),
so that their whole lives may be penetrated by an apostolic spirit and their
apostolic work with contemplation.
Secular Institutes
10. The Holy Spirit, who wondrously fashions the variety of
charisms, has given rise in our time tonew expressions of consecrated life, which
appear as a providential response to the new needs encountered by the Church
today as she carries out her mission in the world.
One thinks in the first place of members of Secular
Institutes seeking to live out their consecration to God in the world through
the profession of the evangelical counsels in the midst of temporal realities;
they wish in this way to be a leaven of wisdom and a witness of grace within
cultural, economic and political life. Through their own specific blending of
presence in the world and consecration, they seek to make present in
society the newness and power of Christ's Kingdom,striving to transfigure the
world from within by the power of the Beatitudes.
In this way, while they
belong completely to God and are thus fully consecrated to his service, their
activity in the ordinary life of the world contributes, by the power of the
Spirit, to shedding the light of the Gospel on temporal realities. Secular Institutes,
each in accordance with its specific nature, thus help to ensure that the
Church has an effective presence in society. valuable role is also played by Clerical
Secular Institutes, in which priests who belong to the diocesan clergy,
even when some of them are recognized as being incardinated in the Institute,
consecrate themselves to Christ through the practice of the evangelical
counsels in accordance with a specific charism. They discover in the spiritual
riches of the Institute to which they belong great help for living more deeply
the spirituality proper to the priesthood and thus they are enabled to be a
leaven of communion and apostolic generosity among their fellow clergy.
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