f) At the beginning of the 21st Century

What is your current situation?

The Order is made up of more than one thousand two hundred religious, not counting the forty-nine convents of contemplative nuns and various Congregations of religious. They are spread mainly through Spain, Latin America, the Philippines and the Hispanic areas of the United States. For the first time they set foot in Africa in 1997. It is in black Africa, in Sierra Leone; but it is still the continent where I was born and the first flowering of my companions sprouted.

In terms of work, they are dedicated above all to parish activity; although a group of religious kept the flame of primitive conventualism burning in the houses of formation. For the rest, a good part of the energies of the Order goes to the missions: in Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Panama and other countries.

The knock of the Second Vatican Council has called them to their origins and to reflection on what they are and what they should be. And currently -I can say it with satisfaction- in my Recollection there is a ferment of concerns, an interest in growing both wide and deep, a deep concern to make true my aspiration to a closely communitarian life.

The first sensation of the one who crowns a hillside is of bewilderment, when looking at a panorama that he does not know. This happens, perhaps, to my friars – and to all Christians – when they go beyond the summit of the year 2000. In many aspects they have to orient themselves, make the composition of the place. It is a normal phase of adaptation. The really important thing is that the Holy Spirit, who impelled me, also guides them along the path of love for God and service to the Church. For my part, I never stop accompanying them and discovering new horizons and routes for them. And, of course, I continue to enjoy in his company the sweetness and delight of living together as brothers.