Telosaes.it

“The Christian path is a live encounter with someone who loves us immensely and helps us to discover our own essence, our most genuine original nature. It is the joy of discovering that we are the fruit of an immeasurable love.”

Telos: You are priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, but you call yourselves the Dehonian fathers. Why is that?

Carlos Luis Suárez: Our appellation -Dehonian- comes from the name of the founder of our congregation, the French priest Léon Dehon, who in 1878 gave life to our institute, driven by the desire to spread the Reign of the Heart of Jesus in souls and in society. An active proponent of the social teaching of Pope Leon XIII (author of the encyclical Rerum Novarum), Fr. Dehon based his Christian life and ministry on restorative spirituality in the face of Love not loved. A man of the Gospel and deep Eucharistic life, Fr. Dehon, with his mindful inner life, engaged in areas varying from school teaching, social apostolate in factories, communication media and missions abroad, just to mention a few areas of his apostolate. From his experiences with faith, we now understand, as stated in our Constitutions, that our Founder expected his clergy to be “servants of reconciliation and prophets of love” starting with their fraternal life and their various duties in service of the Gospel. The appellation Dehonians refers to more than just the clergy, it also includes many other people, lay and consecrated people, who are spiritually attuned to Fr. Dehon’s charisma. And he does not belong to the Congregation, he belongs to the Church. So, all together, they form the Dehonian community.

Superior General of the Congregation. On 27 June Pope Francis granted an audience to the participants of the 25th General Chapter of the Congregation, and in his greeting he jokingly said, “confirmed for a second term, you did not do too badly if you got re-elected!” What are the duties of the Superior General, how have you understood this role so far and what is to be expected in the coming six years?

I see the Holy Father’s kind joke not so much as congratulations, but as paternal encouragement to keep our teamwork alive and growing. We feel we are disciples and must continue to learn and respond to challenges wherever we are in the best way possible, carrying out our apostolate.
In this sense, the superior general works in service of the communion among the clergy of the Congregation and promotes anything that helps us to experience the charisma we share in being creatively faithful. In the last six years, I have met members of the clergy in 45 countries where the Congregation is present. Now there are about 2,200 of us.
Being able to dialogue with them was a real hands-on learning experience. They helped me better understand what our Congregation is. Becoming ever more aware of the body we form was a constant in all the visits. We have to stay agile, attentive, available. Otherwise, this body, which is always part of the Church, will lose its reason for being. In this sense, we are grateful to our many brothers who make all the essential elements of our vocation visible.
It moves me to remember the proof of our clergy’s solidarity in Irpin-Kiev, Ukraine or in the refugee camps of Ngote and in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. I also think of those who, along with many other collaborators of ours, have dedicated themselves to educational activities in different countries and contexts such as Indonesia, Chad and among the Lakota in the United States. And there are lots of other places like this and ways of experiencing and sharing faith and life in everyday mission. Not only faraway, but even here in Rome where the parishioners of Cristo Re, for example, show their warm solidarity by bringing many homeless people not only food but also lots of affection.

Spanish by birth but Venezuelan by mission. Venezuela is the region you belong to. Could you explain what this means in practical terms and especially what this means to you?

Just after my novitiate, I was sent to Venezuela to continue my religious training and complete my theological studies. I was 20 years old. As soon as my mother, Clara, found out, she wrote a letter for Venezuela in her notebook. But I only found out about this much later.
From one mother to another, Clara asked Venezuela to take me in as its son. After living there for over 25 years, I can say that this beautiful, suffering land truly has been a mother and, alongside its simple, welcoming people, my understanding of religious life grew.
I consider leaving my home country and living in areas marked by poverty and violence a blessing, even though it has not always been easy. Learning to see signs of life and hope in the midst of all that was a complex process, but also enriching and, especially, humanising. For a short time, I also had the grace of living in India at the start of our presence there.
Due to a series of circumstances, one of the two pioneering missionaries had to return to his home country and asked me to substitute him until the new one arrived. That semester was a blessing for me. We had nothing and had to constantly move around to try and get to know our surroundings.
Today our communities in India are amazing realities, full of vitality. I always hope that our  mission, both the long-range and the more local one, remains part of our daily life. A day without offering or sharing good news or a good gesture would be a day missed.

In a deeply secular world like today’s, is it still possible to talk about spirituality, mysticism, apostolate, the value of the sacramental life? If so, how?

I think life itself is, in a certain sense, a sacrament. Each life is a place of meeting and this is what takes place with the sacraments. When we celebrate them, we experience a meeting. Spiritual life is opening up a relationship (with someone, with others) that consoles, motivates, worries and also questions, but that in no way alienates us or makes us strangers to ourselves.
Contemplating a landscape, listening to music, admiring a work of art, reading a text, spending time with or thinking about a person we especially love can resonate significantly in the deepest parts of ourselves. The Christian path is a live encounter with someone who loves us immensely and helps us to discover our own essence, our most genuine original nature.
It is the joy of discovering that we are the fruit of an immeasurable love. Only then can we understand that our existence is a gift. A gift can be fragile, yes, but it is precious for those who receive it. Because it has been offered, without asking anything in return and with no other purpose than to express affection and elicit joy. If we understand life in this way, it can’t be anything but a permanent gift. People who are in love know this well. This is where the key to each vocation lies, and even more so for the Christian vocation in all its manifestations. Vocation is a theme for lovers.
Whoever offers their life, whether in the daily life of a family, in a religious community or in any other way, it is because they are aware that it is a gift. A vocation to religious life or priesthood is not possible without understanding that this is a precious gift. One must learn, however, to use that gift in order to protect it from harm that stems from not carefully reading the instruction manual.
In our case, the manual is the Gospel. Starting with the Good News, maintaining communion with the whole Church and paying special attention to the people and places with the greatest need for reparation, the ones others think don’t count or lack value, we can help to create a credible, loving spirituality. A spirituality that does not selfishly close itself off in order to preserve itself, but that knows that in order to exist, it must open up, show itself.
Today we complain about the lack of vocations, in any of their expressions. However, maybe what we need to do is ask ourselves if we have clearly manifested, explained, that Christian life is a gift received, accepted and shared. To use the language of the Gospel, wouldn’t this simply mean having a life and communities (families, parishes, clergy) that were better Samaritans? (Luke 10:25-37).

Marco Sonsini