125 ANNIVERSARY OF SISTER TERESA MIRA (II PART)

We continue deepening in our sister Teresa Mira, contemplating her in a special way as MISSIONARY BY ESSENCE AND EXPERT IN COMMUNION. in this publication we enter into her figure as creator of COMMUNION.

As CMT, we are invited to live a style of relations that recreates and makes visible the mystery of the Trinitarian communion, building up the universal fraternity.

For Teresa Mira and for all spiritual daughter and son of Blessed Francisco Palau, the mission, being our style of life, starts where we are: in community, in family, in the work and place of apostolate… Where I am, there I am called to create communion, being different in my way of doing, of speaking, of thinking; giving example of authentic Christian. “Since we cannot do other thing, let’s be good example, that they cannot deprive us of this” – Teresa Mira.

Let us see some attitudes of Teresa Mira that can help us in our personal, communitarian and familiar spiritual journey, and how Teresa created the communion in her community and wherever she was.

Let us listen some testimonies of whom lived with her and of whom knew her before, during and after the Spanish civil war.

“For her way of being, that she did not tried, but to do good and to love all without distinction, it is impossible that she had enemies. I have never heard anybody to speak ill of her, not even among us, the Sisters that by then formed the community”.

“Teresa made for others all that she could and even a little more. She was bothered by all suffering of others. She delighted to see in all, a joyful gesture in their face, and she could not bear a bitter or painful gesture in the face of others, that is why she did all that was at her hand to relieve them in their pain”.

“She did the impossible to follow perfectly whatever works or duties that were entrusted to her. She left behind always, whatever hindered her of fulfilling her  obligation… I founded her always ready to favor and help you in whatever task. You could get close to her, because she welcomed you with her characteristic smile”.

“Her special virtue, the one that characterized her, was charity. Her treatment and conversation were always of true sister, with much love and sincerity for all. If something special was noticed in her was the mantle of charity that covered all for the peace of the community”.

“Sister Teresa inspired us always full trust in the Lord and made that we felt under His care and paternal protection, for which we were secure that nothing will happen to us that could not be allowed by Him”.

“She tried to put peace in all and avoid all kind of embarrassing or heavy feeling, even in the bosom of our own family”.

“The day of her dead, verbally, she was already considered a holy soul, that she was surrendering herself to others in the midst of a high degree of simplicity. She understood others even to the point of guessing their material situation to help them in the spiritual aspect”.

To create relations of communion in each place where I will be, in my mission, what do I learn of Teresa Mira? What can I imitate of her life?

• The universal love, to avoid all kind of division and discrimination in the community, striving to love to each one of my sisters without distinction. As International Congregation, mutually giving value to each other, respecting each one of our 4Teresa Mira: “Missionary by essence and expert in communion” differences and to make of these differences a great richness which help us to reinforce our bonds of communion.
• The gratuitousness and the sharing of joy in community, to offer with generosity the best of myself in community, my talents, gifts and qualities… to grow and to make grow my community; enjoy with the joy of my sisters and to favor a good ambience in community. Wherever Teresa Mira was, she was able to communicate joy. Like her, to fill up our houses “of the odor of the perfume” of the joy and peace through our testimony of life.
• The responsibility, fulfil with love my duties and responsibilities in the Church and in the community, with a spirit of sacrifice, of creativity, and of availability to the service to others.
• To be a sister for others, a sister that inspires trust and in whom the others can find moral and spiritual support; a sister that communicates peace with sincere and transparent relationships; a sister that serves as reference for others, especially for the younger ones; an understanding sister, that knows how to relativize some situations and to go on with a positive glance towards the present and the future.
• The humility and simplicity, which are, as Pope Francis says “the style of God” and affirms saying that “the true greatness is to make the self, small and servants”. To opt for the way of trusting, of the abandonment and of “the small way” through the example of Teresa of Lisieux, who was a model sister for Teresa Mira. To be humble and to fight against my “ego”, against the desire of power, and the tendency to be the first.

All these characteristics of Teresa Mira should be ours and help us to put into practice our constitutions being like her “Being women inhabited by the Trinity…, happy in her self-surrender… We grow as a community in as much as it increases our capacity to give ourselves without reservation” (Const. 38). Through the distinctive characteristics of our fraternity, our constitutions offer us a whole program of life, that we already discover in the life Teresa Mira: “Simplicity, fraternity and trust in dealings with one another, esteem for the value of friendship, constant joy, practice of the human virtues, renunciation of one’s own interests for the common good, communitarian sense of mission” (Const. 39). Living in tune with the Gospel and imitating our sister Teresa Mira, our heart, our communities, our families and our relations will be the visible signs of Trinitarian communion.