As a member of the CSJ Associate Formation Team, I offered this reflection to our associate candidates to nurture their journeys and deepen their connections to this charism that is already alive and active in their lives. Much like Jean Pierre Medaille helped the first six sisters articulate and live their shared mission, this reflection is meant to give language to the experiences you’ve already had and the ways you’re already living out God’s unifying love.
Speaking of unifying love, last week it came up that some of our associates and associate candidates use the phrase “In Unifying Love” to close out our emails—as I reflect on those words, I thought it was the perfect theme for this reflection! I want to offer you three brief ways that unifying love lives through us as CSJ Associates: carrying an appreciation for difference and diversity, being part of a presence that transcends space and time, and continually nurturing a heart that compels us to be with and for those on the margins of society.
First, an appreciation for difference and diversity. Any student of mine who has taken my ecclesiology class at St. Mary’s Academy will tell you that my common refrain throughout the semester is “unity does not mean uniformity!”
To be a CSJ associate means that we work for unity while appreciating that everyone we encounter is made of the same God we are—yes, even the people we can’t stand! To be an agent of unifying love is to remember that the first person who Jesus gave communion to was not Peter but Judas. God’s unifying love is for everyone, and we play a small part in helping to bring it about in the world!
Second, to be in unifying love is to be part of a presence that transcends space and time. One of the beautiful moments from our virtual gathering was when Estela Garcia, an associate from Arizona, shared that “where one of us is, all of us are.”
It does not matter if we are doing active ministry at one of the CSJ sponsored institutions or letting love live through us in a ministry of prayer and presence: to be a CSJ associate is to live knowing that we are all woven together because our vocation is first and foremost a way of being.
Lastly, to be a CSJ associate is to continually nurture a heart that compels us to be for and with those on the margins of society. The first Sisters of St. Joseph would divide the city, going to those who needed them most, and ask them what they needed. Our way of being is the same. Our spirituality is a wonderful hybrid of Ignatian and Salesian spirituality, and in the Salesian world, there is a beautiful phrase to describe the relationship between us and God: heart speaking to heart.
I offer that for sisters and associates, our hearts must also be attuned to the cries of the hearts of those who society pushes to the edges, and that we go to them, asking what they need and working to bring it to them or them to it. For us, the cries of their heart are the cries of God’s heart, and our lives are a living example of letting Love live and love through us.