Mechernich – Communio in Christo celebrates the power of love on the 47th anniversary of Mother Marie Therese's first foundation - ‘Living holy does not mean mastering all pious practices, but leaving one's own ways’
Mechernich - The Ordo Communionis in Christo celebrated the 47th anniversary of the first foundation of Mother Marie Therese on 2 September with a Holy Mass, dinner and lecture in the refectory of the Mechernich Motherhouse.
Josephina Theresia Linssen, a charismatic mystic from the Netherlands, founded the ‘Unio of Atoning Love’ community in the parish church of St. Lambertus in Mechernich-Holzheim on 1 September 1977. On 8 December 1984, it was absorbed into the Ordo Communionis in Christo, as were other foundations of the sister now known as Mother Marie Therese.
The Unio, like the Ordo today, runs a social welfare organisation in Mechernich and Blankenheim, which operates extensive and beneficial care facilities, including the long-term care facility ‘Communio in Christo’ and the hospice ‘Stella Maris’ in Mechernich and the senior care facility ‘Haus Effata’ in Blankenheim.
The Ordo is headed by Father Jaison Thazhathil, a native of India. Norbert Arnold is the managing director of the social welfare organisation and Sonja Plönnes is the facility manager. Another six Indian Samaritan sisters also live with the Communio members in the Mechernich convent. Their spiritual director is Father Rudolf Ammann Isch.
„Experiencing heaven on earth“
On the anniversary of the first foundation, Superior General Jaison Thazhathil said: ‘Forgiveness is the quickest way to heaven. This profound truth was revealed by Jesus Christ in the last moments of his earthly life on the cross. The lucky recipient was the criminal at his right side. ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom!’ The humble expression in the last breaths of the repentant criminal is met with unexpected grace: ‘Today you will be with me in paradise.’
‘This extraordinary moment of the limitless power of forgiveness served as the inspiration for the founding of the Unio of Atoning Love, which Mother Marie Therese established in Mechernich-Holzheim on 1 September 1977,’ says Father Jaison: ’She was deeply aware of the transformative power of forgiveness and dedicated her life to proclaiming God's unconditional forgiveness and love.’
Thazhathil's representative, the deacon Manfred Lang from Mechernich, spoke in his sermon about the experiences of God described by Mother Marie Therese herself in 26 books. She saw herself as a powerless person who had already experienced heaven during her lifetime. God had addressed the weak in her and she had pledged faithfulness to him in her ‘Fiat’ (‘Let there be, let there be’). God then took responsibility for her life.
‘Living holy does not mean mastering all pious practices, but rather abandoning one's own ways. It means putting your own desires at the back and abstaining from all judgement as far as possible. I must lose myself in his will. For it is not I who would be able to love, but he in me,’ says Lang about Mother Marie Therese's meditation “Source of Love”.
The greatness of God does not lie in his power, but in his goodness, which has absorbed all guilt and all sin. ‘His mission instils courage and enthusiasm in me. I can experience a joy that cannot be described in words,’ says a modified quote from Mother Marie Therese: ’I experience communion with God and my neighbour. All are saved through the unique atoning sacrifice of Jesus. Christ had no other wish when he died than to draw everyone to himself.’
„Democracy lives in Communio“
Manfred Lang also said with a view to the state election results in Thuringia and Saxony the previous evening: ‘Democracy lives in the Ordo Communionis in Christo and before that in the foundation of the Union of Atoning Love - we owe this to our foundress. At its centre is the dignity of man. It finds its foundation and justification in the incarnation of God, in his suffering and death - and in his resurrection, which awaits us all by virtue of his love.’
The word ‘love’ can be used to summarise everything the Bible tells us and what constitutes our Christian faith: ‘The word “love” can be used to summarise the meaning of life - our entire human existence as God wants it to be. Love is important; it is the most important thing of all. It is the quintessence of all the meaning of life, it is from God and emanates from him for all eternity. It flows to us - and we can do nothing but let it flow back to him and to our neighbour.’
Concelebrating with the Superior General were Communio-Spiritual Father Rudolf Ammann ISch and Father Dr Joseph Chelamparambath, the pastor of the Indian Syro-Malankan Catholic community in Bonn. Also at the altar were Father Jean Elex Normil, originally from Haiti and who has been working in the Archdiocese of Cologne for almost 17 years, and Father Patrick Mwanguhya from the diocese of Fort Portal in Uganda, who is doing voluntary service in Germany for five years at the request of his home bishop Robert K. Muhiirwa, as well as Deacon Manfred Lang and Deacon Tilj Puthenveettil.
Sr Lidwina reports from Rome and Poland
After Holy Mass and dinner in the Communio refectory, Sister Lidwina reported on Communio meetings in Rome in May and in Czestochowa and Krakow in July. At the first meeting, between 70 and 80 religious sisters, seminarians and students, mostly from Africa and Asia, met at the Collegio Urbano in Rome.
There, as well as eight weeks later at a meeting with 50 Polish Communio members and sympathisers at the seminary in Czestochowa, the Mechernich delegation presented the profile and way of life of the Ordo Communionis in Christo. In addition, Sister Lidwina was joined in Rome by the Texan nun Marie Kolbe Zamora, OSF, S.T.D., from the General Secretariat of the World Synod in the Vatican.Sister Lidwina reported on the successful conferences in Italy and Poland in pictures, text and some video sequences.In the meantime, four participants of the May conference in Collegio Urbano have already been guests at the motherhouse of Communio in Christo in Mechernicher Bruchgasse, where they are involved in pastoral care and work.
A number of guests from Poland are expected to attend the 40th anniversary of the founding of Communio on 8 December at 2 p.m. with the diocesan bishop of Aachen, Dr Helmut Dieser, in the parish church of St. Johannes Baptist in Mechernich.Among them will be Teresa Swieca, the leader of the Communio group in Mechernich's Polish twin town, as well as priests Lukasz Katny and Dr Piotr Malinowski.
pp/Agentur ProfiPress
