[1] Preference will be given to help parishes through preaching (tridua, novenas, feasts of patron saints), and the administration of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Also a priority is the mission-outreach in parishes and in rural areas according to the method and spirit of Saint Alphonsus Liguori, in all its forms:
- intensive mission,
- ongoing mission,
- missions preached to the youth and children, the sick, factory workers,
- open missions, etc.
In response to the Bishops’ requests, the Institute can accept the direction of parishes, preferably in missionary areas or those in more need. We will be attentive to respect, rescue and elevate the religious and ethnic traditions proper to each place, so that the Gospel will be better received and take deeper root in hearts.
[2] The religious who take care of parishes should give priority, in an enthusiastic pastoral action, to the following:
- The Sunday liturgy. The center of the parish pastoral work should always be the Sunday Mass, especially working to promote the solemnity of the celebration so that the faithful will participate each time more knowingly, devoutly and actively [3]. This should be complemented by communion to the sick.
- To know how to direct those who have the dispositions to the practice of the Spiritual Exercises; to assume the responsibility of teaching catechism to children and adults.
- To establish convenient lay associations, so that in a diversified unity all the faithful lay Christians can work in an apostolate according to their own charisms and dispositions. Children and youth should be attended to according to the spirit of Saint Philip Neri and Saint John Bosco. The “Oratory” is still relevant.
- The central moments for the parochial pastoral work will be: Holy Week, Feasts of Patron Saints, First Communions, Confirmations, Popular Missions and Courses of Catholic Culture.
[4] Religious dedicated preferably to work in parishes, in popular missions or in the care of parishes that are most in need, will through their actions be a prolongation through their actions of the redeeming work of the same Christ. To better fulfill their mission, they must be convinced that the best way to develop an efficient apostolate is an intimate union with the Incarnate Word and love for souls to the point of giving themselves up heroically without reserve. We must have special appreciation for the teaching of the great masters of sacred preaching, particularly in how the preaching should be done. “All those who announce the Word, are the voice of the Word.” [6]
Catechism
[7] “Also to you the Church entrusts the service of the Word and catechesis, the education in the faith, the cultural and human promotion, asks from you adequate preparation and therefore always more intense…”[8]
[9] Sacred Scripture must be the “soul of our soul,” of our spirituality, Theology, preaching, catechesis and of our pastoral work. What Saint Jerome said about an acquaintance should also be said of us, “Indeed by constant reading and long-continued meditation he had made his breast a library of Christ,”[10] since for us “the Word of God doesn’t represent anything less than the Body of Christ.”[11]
[5] St. Gregory the Great, Pastoral Rule, especially Part III, St. Louis Marie Grignon de Montfort, Rule missionary priests of the Society of Mary, nn º 50-65, St. Alphonsus Liguori, Letter to a religious friend, Letter to a new bishop and Sermones abbreviated, in ascetic Works, T. II, Ed BAC, Madrid, 1954, p. 335ss, p. 379ss and 465ss; Saint Anthony Maria Claret, missionary method or fields in the villages and slums of cities and the missionary Theophilus Charter; Sacred Congregation for Bishops, Directory for Bishops Ecclesiae Imago, especially, 557a and 169, John Paul II, Address to Participants in the Italian National Congress on Missions to the people for 80 years (06/02/1981), OR (08/03/1981), 2.
[6] Saint Augustin, Sermo 288, 4: “Omnis homo annuntiator Verbi, vox Verbi est”.