THE SECOND SESSION OF THE FIC SPIRITUAL JOURNEY, 2017 GROUP.

The second session of the group for Spiritual Journey of the Ghana Province took place in Tumu Community from the 11^thFebruary to 12^th February, 2017.

Participants: Bros. Fabian Kuupille, Hans van Wouwen, Severious Sentu, Felicio Gyeyir, Irenius Nimbare and Isidore Aabeisie.

The Director, Bro Didas Toogumo welcomed all participants and reminded us that the purpose of the session was to see how far we have gone since our first meeting in Wa on 9^th December 2016 with the former Director, Bro Albert Ketelaars. It was also to share with each other our journey so far in terms of the exercises we received from Bro. Guido Sukarman, the spiritual directions, the keeping of the dairy and the choosing of the symbols.

The encounter was put into three sessions. The first was a prayer service organised by the director, followed by the sharing session and then the planning for the next encounter.

In the prayer service on the theme: ‘Prayer’, the director gave a brief and inspiring introduction. He reminded participants that we are called to walk closely with our God. He encouraged us to use this opportunity to examine our journey so far and see how closely we have journeyed with him. He further indicated to us that we should consider ourselves to be set apart from the other brothers for this programme and we are to show that difference in our communities and the province as a whole from the way we attach importance to our spiritual life.

He compared prayer to the spring that flows in us giving us all we need to live well in our communities and to do our apostolate, in the absence of which we will experience challenges in community life and in apostolate.

Articles 64, 65 and 66 of our Constitutions were read meditatively. The Gospel reading from Mt 6:5-6 emphasised on the need to pray.

The next stage of the encounter was sharing of our experiences so far in the journey.

The Director explained that it was meant to encourage each other and to identify the difficulties that we were facing; and to see how we could support each other.

The participants shared about what each had been doing since the 9^th December 2016. The sharing included our experience with the exercises from Bro. Guido, the keeping of the dairy, the spiritual direction, and the choosing of the symbol.

The Director, noticing that two of us had not yet met their spiritual directors, advised that they do so before the next meeting because the exercise is more beneficial if we share often especially with our spiritual directors. He suggested that we get one closer to us if the distance from the directors we had since formation would be an obstacle. On the symbols he said we should choose a symbol that speaks to us in terms of our live as religious and a brother FIC. He also reminded us that symbols speak differently to different people. We might not fine meaning in some one’s symbol yet it speaks deeply to the person and so we should only try to explain how the symbol speaks to us as a brother FIC to the understanding of the group.

In the last session, participants chose to have their next meeting at St. Louis community on 29^th April 2017. The Director concluded by asking participants to try and spend time on the programme so as to derive the maximum benefits. He advised us to spend time on the exercise to enable sharing from our lived experience and not to approach the programme as an academic exercise which hangs in the air.

This encounter marks the beginning of the compass stage in the spiritual journey.

By Bro. Isidore Aabeisie Nelson.