Did you know that the Portuguese Province’s main aim for the coming years is to provide a service that is increasingly warmer and more humane, based on Hospitality?
My name is Sílvia Moreira. I have been the Provincial Superior of the Sisters Hospitallers’ Portuguese Province since last October. Regarding myself, I was born in Porto (Portugal) in 1973, I joined the congregation in 1999 and I made my perpetual profession in 2006. I have a degree in social work and theology. Over the past ten years, I have carried out my Hospitaller service in Africa, specifically in Angola and Mozambique.
Throughout 2018, the Portuguese Province, in communion with the entire congregation, experienced the dynamism that accompanies us when holding general and provincial chapters. The period before they are held is full of prayer and when they take place, although not all the sisters are there, we experience them in deep unity with the sisters and collaborators who are present, eagerly awaiting the information about what happens there.
Main challenges and wishes for the coming years
Consistent with the congregation’s General Chapter, during the last chapter held in the Portuguese Province we identified four main challenges in line with the work done in our communities, which are:
- The need to restructure the communities and the revitalisation of our consecrated Hospitaller life.
- The importance of creating a more structured work dynamic with young people, based on openness and investing time and effort in order to carry out actions that encourage their encounter with God and awakening their vocational discernment.
- Continuously investing in training our collaborators on the Hospitaller Identity with the aim of increasing their sense of belonging.
- The sustainability of our works.
All these challenges we have identified, as well as how we would like to respond to them, have a single purpose: to provide an increasingly warmer and more humane service to the people the mission reaches out to, with Hospitality as the basis.
