MESSAGE TO THE GENERAL CHAPTER OF THE MARIAN FATHERS

VATICAN CITY, JUL 1, 1999 (VIS) - This morning, John Paul II received the participants in the general chapter of the Congregation of Marians of the Immaculate Conception, to whom he gave a Message.

"It is highly significant," the Pope writes in the Message, "that the congregation, the first to be founded by a Pole, should be clearly Marian in character, being linked to the Immaculate Virgin. In the seventeenth century, when crisis began to loom in the then strong Polish State, Fr. Stanislaw Papczynski sought support in the Immaculate Virgin."

The Holy Father then referred to Blessed George Matulaitis-Matulewicz, who renewed the congregation, and he recalled his love for the Church, "which he left to us in patrimony."

"In faithful adherence to the Magisterium of the Church, continue to cultivate your numerous activities in Poland, in other European countries, in America and in Australia. I encourage you to persevere and I bless the schools, publishing houses, parishes, retreats, shrines, charitable works, services for emigrants and the other benevolent institutions in which you are involved."

The Holy Father made particular mention of the efforts of the religious in Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan and expressed his satisfaction at the work accomplished in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia as well as at the activity carried out in Estonia during the last five years. He recalled: "Many of your brethren paid for their dedication to the cause of the Gospel with their lives or with years in labor camps."

The Pope concluded: "May the Lord particularly render your activity in Africa rich with spiritual fruit, especially in troubled Rwanda and, in the near future (when you go to) Cameroon, as well as in other frontier zones such as Alaska or other regions where priests are few."

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