“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: 
A time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot…” 
(Ecclesiastes 3: 1 ff.)

In our day-to-day lives, we are increasingly aware of the need to be silent in order to quieten down and to allow so many lived realities to settle, to move on from the telling of anecdotes to what is essential.  Maybe this will help you to understand our delay in writing...

1. A time for farewells and readjustments

We ended last year extremely tired from Covid. We have started the new year with renewed strength, saying farewells in the community, in the parish, in the project... and the arrival of people who revitalise our work.

It is a time for nurturing, remodelling, rehearsing, a time for "fine-tuning" about how and where we want to be, about what contribution we can make in this time of transition; a time to embrace what is different and to continue to bring to life the Gospel beauty of the project that we undertook with Antoine, the previous parish priest.

2. A time to move

In March this year, the diocese of Rabat offered us a house to live in for the development of the women's project. A French woman living in Oujda gave a two-storey villa as an inheritance to the church of Rabat.

DAR KUM is the name we have given to the house of welcome. DAR in Dariya means house; KUM refers to the gospel text, “Talita Kum” (“girl, stand up”), and in Dariya the same word means "yours".  Your house, the house where you can stand up. May our opening of doors be just that: a place to welcome women and children for different activities; a safe place, where each one can be herself, where she can grow, and a place of opportunity... 

It is a time to open to welcoming and to what is new, a time to broaden our horizons and to share life.

3. A time to dream and plan

With the new house come new projects and new dreams that touch our hearts and motivate us. Sometimes these all come together at the same time and it can be difficult to know how to prioritise and to measure our strength. 

Dar Kum (the women's shelter for women in difficulty) is now up and running, with great hopes.

And we continue to support the children and young people who are cared for by the Church of Oujda, those who wish to learn and train. 

A time to consolidate, to let things emerge, to develop and to trust.

4. A time for us to know that we do not know anything

From time to time and through concrete events, the reality of migration reminds us that we are treading on ground that is obscure, unknown and uncertain. We sense injustices and pain beyond what is communicated to us. During this time, we have become more aware that child trafficking, smuggling, mafias and extortion are part of the reality of the people with whom we live. 
 
Learning to walk through uncertainty, based on our lack of knowledge. Calls to be silent, time to look beyond the first thing we see or feel, not to judge, to accompany from a position of not knowing. To be.

5. A time of opening up of borders: 

We really appreciate what once seemed obvious and what was snatched away from us by a pandemic!  With the opening up of our borders, we are finally experiencing what previously we had not been able to enjoy in Oujda: that our friends and companions can come and visit us. Finally, María Teresa Alcón rscj and M. Carmen Muñoz rjm were able to come and visit Oujda (the two religious appointed by the two congregations to accompany the project).

The two Congregations have reopened their volunteer programmes and we have launched our own project, eager to share our life and mission with others. 

A time to be close together even at a distance, a time to open up our house and your house to our Sisters, a time to widen the tent, a time of hope.

On the eve of the Feast of the Sacred Heart, a great feast for rscj and an important feast for rjm as well, we continue to pray to Him.  May he show us how to know how to say goodbye, how to welcome, how to settle, how to dream, how to hold on to dreams and how to walk in the midst of uncertainties. And doing it all in His way.

With love,
Montse Prats rscj and Rosa Ros rjm

Click here to read the full letter.
 

Original article from: https://www.rscj.es/oujda-marruecos/. Translated and re-published with permission from the author.